


A Fate of Their Own

by fluffsies



Category: The Dark Crystal (1982), The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Anal Sex, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Eventual Happy Ending, Gore, M/M, Mutual Masturbation, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Possessive Behavior, Rating May Change, Self-Harm, Sexual Content, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-13
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2020-12-14 15:44:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21018254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluffsies/pseuds/fluffsies
Summary: A take on how the Heretic and the Wanderer came to be, how their relationship was forged, and how they were effectively exiled. Also dives into the Hunter and the Archer's broken relationship. Set many years - uh, trine - before the TV series.





	1. A Budding, Blossoming Bond

He couldn’t ignore it.

It was infuriating, it was debilitating - the Conqueror couldn’t take it anymore. A warrior must have a clear head and a clear mind, a cold heart and a cold stare. Why, then, was he plagued with these... feelings? It enraged him, drove him further to violence and to pillage, to force that feeling down into submission, to drown it in his blood. But when his sword came down on the insignificant creatures of Thra, he couldn’t help but hesitate the slightest bit. For he saw himself in them... he saw his other half in them.

It wasn’t an uncommon occurrence for the two of them to cross paths, maybe once in a unum, but each time it happened, he became increasingly agitated. 

He came across the Wanderer while in another village, their most recent encounter.

As he took what he wanted, took lives, their eyes met, and he paused, and a Podling took that opportunity to scurry away. urGoh’s eyes remained relaxed while skekGra’s eyes narrowed. He knew he couldn’t strike the mystic down, for the skeksis made a pact to avoid them at all costs - for their death meant the skeksis own death, a fate they could not accept. That, and this mystic was his own. Out of every mystic in the tribe, it had to be his that he locked eyes with, every single time.

skekGra growled fiercely, tightening the grip on his blade, “Be gone, you shriveled old monk! Crawl back to your desert!” He turned with a swish of his cape, stomping to continue his pillaging, but he stopped in his tracks when a sharp pain blossomed in his palm. He looked down to see black, oozing blood smear around the handle of his weapon.

“You...” He turned back around to the mystic, “...and I...” The mystic held up his palm, fresh blood oozing out as well, “... are one...” bloodied blade in another hand, “do... not... forget.”

skekGra snarled as he marched over to the mystic, grabbing the front of his robe and hauling him up to his beak, “How dare you mark me, mystic! You think a wound like this will slow me down?! You are a fool to stand in my way, you are a fool to even stand before me!” The blood smeared against the Wanderer’s clothing, staining it.

Then it happened. Their eyes clouded over at once as they stared into each other, and a vision appeared. They felt the spirit of Thra course within them, through them, through one and out the other. It was fuzzy, warbled, but they recognized the crystal – purely white. Two figures, too shadowed to recognize, stepped forward, and melted into each other. Then, a blinding white light flashed, engulfing the scene. And their vision returned, staring once again back at each other.

urGoh gasped and pushed off of skekGra with all of his limbs with a force that knocked the Conqueror onto the ground. skekGra scrambled upright, weapon pointed, “what did you do?! What was that?!”

urGoh stared at the ground, stared at Thra, for he sensed that was where the vision originated. He murmured, “I… I do not… know.” He stood up quickly and retreated away from the village, away from the Conqueror, confused and bewildered. The skeksis watched him leave, panting to alleviate his heartrate. He turned his beak to the sky and released a vicious roar, signaling that his pillage was to continue.

urGoh was one of the three mystics that were keen on traveling beyond their sanctuary, along with the Archer and the Swimmer. In their early days, he was easily distracted by Thra’s beauty and value. While caravanning with other mystics, urGoh would “wander” off to investigate a sight, which led to another sight, and another - and each time he ventured off, he found it increasingly difficult to find his way back home. The mystics, being in their kind nature, named him the “Wanderer” for that reason, rather than the “Slacker” or the “Airhead” as urSol joked. On his last departure from the sanctuary, he told urSu that Thra was his home, and he wanted to embrace it all that he could, and free himself to wander as much as he pleased.

skekGra, funnily enough, was the same way in his early days. In his case, he saw items of his liking and would go to retrieve them, whether it was a fruit on a high tree or a necklace on a Gelfling maid, he took what he wanted, branding him the Conqueror.

Time passed since the routine fated encounter, and while urGoh ventured out, seeking answers to the strange vision, his image still plagued skekGra’s head as he itched through his hair incessantly.

In his camp, while the fire blazed on outside, he huddled in his tent, confused and enraged at the feeling he was experiencing when thinking of the mystic’s eyes. The skeksis vowed to avoid their mystics at all costs, for the protection of their eternal life, and the mystics agreed to live in recluse to avoid the skeksis evil rule. Why, why by Thra’s name did his have to be “the Wanderer”? skekGra was in conflict. He refused to play over the vision in his head, believing it was a mystic enchantment, meant to hypnotize him. But as hard as he found, urGoh remained in his mind. After seeing what a bumbling fool his counterpart was, he may end up falling off a cliff or not moving quick enough away from a falling boulder, and end up killing both of them!

At least, that’s the justification he told himself for the plan his head began to brew, scritching his hair again. When he thought of urGoh, he... yearned. His body was wracked in waves of pure need, the pure feeling of wanting to see those eyes again, to be near him again, to be whole again, and it disgusted him. No! He would do this for his own selfish protection, to ensure nothing happens to his eternal life - _yes!_ He would capture and contain the mystic… _conquer_ him.

~*~

It was difficult to find one known as “the Wanderer”, but his weapon made mouths move faster than the mystic could walk. When their eyes met again, a week later, it was dark, and they were alone in the outskirts where forest met desert, skeksis met mystic. urGoh’s eyes went wide this time, genuinely surprised, and he fully turned his body to the other. “...yes?”

A strung sang in his heart, and he nearly gagged, especially when the twitch of his eye seemed to be mirrored in the mystic. That proved to him that all he’d been feeling was also felt by the one before him. He couldn’t take it.

With a roar, he charged the mystic, weapon and rope in hands. urGoh let out a grunt, but his movements were too slow to counter, and he knew it, so he braced himself. skekGra grabbed hold of urGoh’s dominant set of wrists, planting a foot on his chest. While slow, urGoh proved strong, and a large wallop from his tail knocked the wind out of skekGra. He shook it off, recoiling behind him to hold the cold blade against the mystic’s long neck.

“You... _won’t_.” urGoh said firm, eyes calm as he looked back.

“Don’t tempt my hand, mystic, I can take a lot of pain,” skekGra growled. For a tense moment, those eyes met again, and skekGra felt vile as his heart beat faster. urGoh’s heartbeat, rather, was calm, for despite the blade at his throat, he knew he was in no danger. Skeksis were too selfish.

“What... do you... wa-“

“I want you to come with me, fool. You are a prisoner of the Conqueror from this point on.”

urGoh chuckled, rubbing his jaw against the blade in a mock cuddle, “oh... dear... _am_ I?”

Yet again, it happened. A surge of energy swirled inside their cores. This time, they saw imagery of war, small figures, assumed to be Gelfling, fighting against hulking figures carrying swords. Suddenly, black masses began capturing the Gelfling and hauling them away as villages were engulfed in flames. The smoke billowed up, and faded, as did the vision.

skekGra panted heavily and sunk his claws into urGoh’s neck. “_Bastard_!” he screeched, and braced himself, as he clocked urGoh on the skull with the blunt end of the blade. Skeksis, in all meanings of the phrase, were hardheaded, so the ringing pain was dulled for him - but urGoh’s flesh was soft, and he doubled over with a groan. skekGra once again gathered urGoh’s top set of hands, tied them behind his back, and even stomped heavily on his tail for good measure (regretting it slightly as a sting of pain ran up his own spine). He repeated it for the second row, tying the knots harder than he should have out of anger, and almost retied them, for his own wrists began to burn, but he endured. Finally, he tied a thick rope to the base of urGoh’s neck at his collarbone and held the rope like a leash.

“What is... this?” urGoh had been quiet through the whole ordeal, trying to stifle his head’s throbbing, not offering much resistance. “As I said, I am taking you prisoner - to ensure my own safety. You walk in front, where I can see you. Move, now!” skekGra tugged on the leash, and urGoh shuffled forward.

skekGra quickly learned how infuriating the mystics were, another reason why the skeksis avoided them. But this mystic, his mystic, was a headache, more so than the one he had from the blow. urGoh walked at about the same pace as a rock, and no amount of tugging or kicking made him budge. He was beginning to think it was purposeful. skekGra let out a frustrated scoff and thrust his hands under urGoh’s form. urGoh yelped lowly, and struggled, kicking skekGra in the bottom jaw. skekGra grunted, and urGoh wiggled free from his grasp – only to fall on his back and be stunned. skekGra shook the numbness out of his limbs, knees almost buckling over from feeling the fall. He lifted urGoh into his arms and over his shoulder. urGoh was about as heavy as he looked, but the Conqueror would rather be struck dead than show weakness.

“Put...! Me...! D-!”

“Down? Did you suddenly decide to walk like a normal creature perhaps? No, if you refuse to cooperate then you’ll be treated like a fizzgig.”

“Ah... a prized... pet.”

“Shut your mouth!” The Conqueror snapped.

The journey was long, and anytime urGoh tried to speak, skekGra would finish his thought or violently cut him off, to which urGoh swatted him in the stomach with his thick tail. At one point, bracing himself, he dropped urGoh to the ground on purpose for speaking so slowly, hurting his own back again in the process. As the journey went on, his bones creaked, but his nerves were all activated at once, and he felt alive. He hated to say it, hated to think it, hated to realize it - but he enjoyed touching urGoh. He enjoyed the warmth, the closeness. He needed it. He needed... to be one again. He swallowed that feeling down like a clawing crawlie.

Upon getting to the Castle of the Crystal, urGoh could feel the ache in his own arms, and he could tell skekGra was exhausted from the journey and the weight. The Gelfling guards were anxious upon seeing the mystic, but they averted their eyes when skekGra snapped his beak. The castle was full of hallways, but the hallway he was taken down was adorned with riches and skulls of past plunders. skekGra brought him to a large room with a desk, couches and pillows, herbs and painted cloth lining the walls, and bookcases. He thought it was a lovely room, truthfully, that suited his own tastes. That is, until he saw the in-wall prison cell, which he was effectively thrown into, onto the cold hard floor, stunning him again.

skekGra released his four arms, then clasped a thick metal collar attached to the far wall was on his neck, below his jaw, pressing onto his throat as he swallowed. Then the door was shut and locked by a key around skekGra’s neck.

skekGra panted heavily, stumbling backward to collapse onto a couch, “now, hah... now I have nothing, hah, to worry about.”

“...nothing...? Or... _everything_?” urGoh murmured, inquired, groaning as he sat up. He could feel it, he could feel it the entire walk there. skekGra needed to touch him, delighted in holding him, and was yearning for his touch even now that he put him down.

“Shut it, mystic! You’re lucky - I only reserve this cell for important prisoners we needed information from, but now I can just kill them and be done with it, since you’ll be occupying it for quite some time.”

“For... how... long?”

skekGra bent forward, sneered at him from across the room, tongue slithering out, “_Eternity_.”

~*~

Being in a cage did not suit the one known as “the Wanderer”. But urGoh was a calm creature, and patience was his tool. Podling slaves brought him food, and, with some coaxing, were able to sneak him in some materials to sew, paint, and craft (which he hid when skekGra was around). Speaking of which, skekGra was not gone as often as he suspected, and it surprised him to say the least. One full week of rest at the station, and only three days of conquering. It seemed that his duties as a chairman skeksis outweighed his conquering duties. He’d always come back sweaty, dirty, stinky, tired and beaten, but successful. He forged on, spreading skeksis rule and power, and striking down those that opposed.

In the first week back, he would only snap at urGoh if he tried to speak, throwing books to clang against the bars. In the second week back, he gave urGoh short answers to his questions, a grunt or a word. urGoh quickly learned that five questions were his limit for the day, as skekGra would become agitated at his slowness and become aggressive. That same week, he noticed the puppets urGoh made, and yelled at him, but there was no real bite to it, for he did not make a move to remove them.

Towards the end of that same week, urGoh was silently, gently brushing down the hair of a gelfling puppet, when he felt eyes on his back. He turned his snout to the couch tangent to his cell, and saw skekGra reclining, cheek on hand, watching him with a bored expression. His eyes, however, they held something to them that made urGoh furrow his brow and look away.

“How do you do that.”

He had goosebumps. He turned back to skekGra to see him rise from his position. “Do... what?” he murmured, turning back to his craft. skekGra never asked anything of him, never initiated communication other than reprimanding him.

“_Those_! What are they!? How did you make them?!” skekGra shouted, gesturing wildly at the pile of puppets near urGoh’s feet.

“Oh...” he said slowly, thinking, “would... you like... to learn?” He offered, wholesome. skekGra didn’t answer, but the feathers around his neck ruffled and stood on end, as his face seemed in thought. He whipped around suddenly, “feh, I have better things to do than make toys!” He sat at his desk, looking over papers, letters of Gelfling settlements pledging their allegiance. urGoh hummed, “another... time... perhaps.”

Later, skekGra would wordlessly open the cell to toss the mystic pillows and blankets, complaining in the mornings that he felt his coldness at night through their bond. urGoh chuckled but remained grateful.

By the fourth week, another skeksis noticed him. skekGra burst through the door laughing, causing urGoh to launch a puppet to the ceiling in surprise. He looked solemnly at the broken figure’s pieces on the ground, then turned to see the disturbance. skekGra was conversing as he walked in, and the person he talked with entered behind him. urGoh’s blood chilled, he stood and pressed himself to the nearest wall.

_The Hunter._

skekGra sat on the couch, still recalling the story to the Hunter as he removed his skull mask and sat by him. The Hunter’s face was gnarled, covered in spikes rather than the wrinkles the others had. His eyes were squinty, piercing appearance from their light blue color. And those eyes bore into urGoh’s very soul when the Hunter noticed him. urGoh breathed in swiftly, as if his soul would be sucked out if he didn’t hold it in, eyes as wide as they could open.

“What the fuck is that doing here,” the Hunter’s gravel voice growled, eyes never leaving urGoh, interrupting skekGra’s story. skekGra looked to urGoh, “oh, the mystic? Hah, he was being a pain. I figured that I may as well lock him up, make sure he doesn’t get me killed, right?”

skekMal hummed, finally turning his attention to skekGra, “if you say so.”

The two skeksis shared stories for hours over alcohol, laughing at graphic details of their gore, of the pleading of lesser creatures, sharing trophies of their victories. urGoh curled into a tight ball under thick blankets, placing both sets of hands, and even his feet, over his ears. Their words made him sick, made him want to vomit and wail at the thought of an innocent being of Thra suffering.

At some point, another voice had entered the room, and urGoh looked up from his bundle. Another skeksis, skekZok the Ritual Master, entered, “skekMal! skekGra! Friends, dinner is about to begin! Please, come and join us! skekMal, the Emperor has missed you – he wishes to hear all of your tales!” The Ritual Master flung his arms wide in a welcoming gesture, and when his eyes darted to the cell, his smile faded to a frightened look. skekGra ignored it, quite drunk at that point, and stood up, pulling skekMal by the armor.

“Yes! Yes!” he slurred.

“Oy, fuck off, ya bastard,” skekMal groaned as he was practically dragged from the room. skekZok stepped aside as the two stumbled out, glancing one more at urGoh with an uneasy expression. urGoh stuck his tongue out at him, enjoying the offended scoff he was given as the Ritual Master stormed away.

Later on in the night, as the skeksis conversed in small groups before the throne, the Ritual Master whispered to the Emperor, and he roared, “What?! skekGra! Come forth at once!”

skekGra jumped, and composed himself as he moved to kneel before skekSo, “yes, sire?”

“skekZok tells me you have a _mystic_ caged in your chambers. What is the meaning of this?! How dare you bring a mystic within these walls! _Explain_!”

Hissing whispers erupted from the others, except for skekMal who crossed his arms, and skekSil, of course, who whimpered in interest.

“Sire, he is my own mystic. He is called ‘the Wanderer’, for he does not reside in hiding with the rest of the mystics. He was interrupting my quests regularly, and he was careless. I took it upon myself to lock him up, to ensure that I would not perish because of his airheaded wandering. I was planning to keep him there for that reason, to ensure my immortality to the fullest,” skekGra bowed his head down, “I apologize, your excellence, for it is a matter not up to me. I can release him immediately at your command.”

skekSo hummed, “that is… a good reasoning, Conqueror. How intriguing… I never thought of it that way…”

“What if our mystics get themselves killed, then we will die as well! What a terrifying thought!” skekOk screeched, causing the other skeksis to wail and cry out. skekSil’s whimper faded in and out.

“Perhaps we could gather them all and…” skekSo trailed off in thought.

“No!” skekMal roared suddenly, rendering the courtroom silent. “The Conqueror captured ‘is mystic ‘cause it wandered to ‘im – he di’n’t go out ‘n snatch it! ‘e’s strong enough to handle it, you lot are too weak!” The skeksis whimpered in fear. “I know better than anyone, goin’ after yer mystic is… a bad idea. It’s best to avoid ‘em…” skekMal looked to skekGra with a pointed expression, to convey he didn’t approve of urGoh’s presence, that he knew something… more.

“How long has this mystic been in your chamber?” skekSo inquired.

“A few weeks, sire. It was not my intention to hide it from you, but I failed to realize its significance, and I should have asked for your grace first. I apologize,” he declared, bowing his head again.

skekSo huffed, smiling, “my, so loyal and dedicated to your Emperor! So humble! I admire you, skekGra, you are one of my most trusted allies – my valuable warrior, the Conqueror! Your reasoning is just in my eyes, and for you, I can oversee this mistake. You have my blessing, and as long as that mystic stays within his prison, it can stay.”

“Thank you, sire,” skekGra stood, sighing.

“As for the rest of you, none of you bums leave the castle anyway, so there’s no chance of you even seeing your mystic! They are all safe in hiding, so no more talk of them!” skekSo bellowed, and the skeksis cheered.

skekGra moved to retire to his chambers, obviously shaken and done with the evening, but a severely clawed hand clasped on his shoulder.

“Y’be careful, y’hear me?” skekMal said lowly, staring into skekGra’s eyes for emphasis. He lowered his voice to a gravelly whisper, eyeing to see if anyone else was close, “_have y’seen it yet_?”

skekGra lowered his voice as well, “_seen ‘it’_?”

“_The vision_.” skekGra went rigid and cold, and his expression gave skekMal his answer. “Thought so, mate. Y'd do well to avert yer eyes, no good can come from thoughts like that. Know where yer loyalty lies.”

skekMal sunk his talons into skekGra’s shoulder briefly, and moved away, immediately crowded around by skeksis showering him with questions. skekGra watched the other get engulfed, swallowed, and went to his chambers to retire.

~*~

Few times had the Chamberlain come into skekGra’s quarters to harass the mystic. However, upon hearing how slowly the mystic spoke, the clever names he was called, and the threat of being told on for trespassing in the Conqueror’s territory, he never returned. urGoh chuckled, and was a bit disappointed, for teasing the Chamberlain was a fun new change that didn’t last long enough for him to enjoy. However, a breakthrough was about to occur that same week.

urGoh was taking his usual midday nap, curled up into his tail in a corner, using the bedding plush bedding, when he was jolted awake by a slamming door. He thanked himself that he wasn’t holding a puppet this time. He yawned and crooned his neck up to see skekGra stomp about in a circle, fuming, talking to himself. He knew it was risky, especially in such a mood, but why not try. If he couldn’t wander physically, he’ll wander as far as his mind will let him.

“What’s... wrong...?” Better keep it short - two words.

“The council, that’s what’s wrong!” skekGra barked at him. Well, he at least answered. “Tell... me more,” he offered.

skekGra paused his tantrum, and narrowed his eyes at the mystic, “... why should I?” He regarded skekMal’s words and what his eyes held beneath them – that he shouldn’t trust a mystic.

urGoh held all four of his palms up, “I... merely... want... to-“

“Talk?! No talking will be done by you, mystic! We'll be here for the next thousand trine!” But skekGra’s fierce expression softened suddenly, as his feathers ruffled again, his eyes wide. His gaze wandered to the pile of materials urGoh had in another corner, and the image of skekMal faded away. He broke out in a smile, “...but if it’s listening you want to do, then I have a price,” skekGra offered his own ploy.

urGoh’s eyes widened, and he offered a gentle smile of his own, for he knew a game when he sensed one, “name... it.”

skekGra came forth, unlocked the cage, and surprisingly, stepped in and sat down cross legged in front of urGoh. urGoh froze a bit at the intrusion and pressed himself slightly more against the wall.

“Teach me how to make these-,” he motioned to the puppets, “-and I will talk your ear off.”

Oh. Well, that could be arranged.

The bonded pair sat for hours. skekGra would ramble on in a tangent about his frustrations, gesturing wildly, but his eyes remained focused on urGoh’s hands as he molded clay and sewed miniature clothing, like a hunter stalking prey. At times, urGoh would cease his movements and motion for skekGra to copy what he had done, and skekGra’s words would fizzle out. He’d turn his attention down to the bumpy little figure in his hand and did his best to do as urGoh had done. To urGoh’s surprise, the skeksis was completely absorbed by this type of work. He wasn’t scratching his head as he usually did when reading over papers.

“Make... this seam... tighter,” urGoh would correct him in a gentle, low murmur, and again to his surprise, skekGra would hum in acknowledgement and fix what he’d been told to. The skeksis would hiss lowly if urGoh moved his hands too close to him or his puppet, and urGoh noted that was an interaction to save for a later day. This was the most progress he’d made in his entire time here, and he wanted to be careful not to ruin his progress. skekGra really was interested and wanted to learn, it seemed, and urGoh couldn’t help but blossom a genuine smile as his heart thumped. He felt a closeness, a fondness watching the skeksis enjoy his hobby, be eager to participate, and at least tolerating his company. After he’d finish a step, he’d look to urGoh for approval, to which he’d get a smile and nod. Then the ranting would bubble up again, and urGoh would craft again.

By the time they were finished, each made their own skeksis puppet (skekGra didn’t want to do a Gelfiling, or any other “lower life form”). skekGra’s was bumpy and had crooked, uneven stitches, but it was recognizable and functional. skekGra’s pupils were blown wide, his feathers out as far as they would raise, and his blue complexion even faltered as it faded to a pink. His smile was as wide as ever as he examined his dumpy little puppet. It was as if it was a valuable jewel, in which he’d spent many trine to find, and urGoh knew he would treasure this.

“Hah! I’m a natural!” he positively beamed.

urGoh sat in warm silence, smiling at the happiness he could bring his other half, but something hung in the room that needed to be addressed.

“May I... say... something?” urGoh tried.

skekGra halted, stared at him, “What is it?”

“Will... you... let me... finish... it... all... as well?” he asked with a sly smile, eyeing the skeksis.

The Conqueror huffed, “fine, fine - I guess you could say you ‘earned’ it. But hurry up!”

“I... think... the other... skeksis... fail to see... your potential... as you said,” he started, referring to all the ranting skekGra had done during their session. skekGra’s feathers raised, and he looked to the mystic. He was actually surprised and… touched that the mystic was listening to him the entire time. He wasn’t actually expecting urGoh to listen – he just needed something to complain to, like skekTek to his pets.

“And... I... know... how it... feels... to want to... explore... to see... vaster... horizons... and how... difficult... it can be... when you’re... held back,” urGoh closed his eyes. It sounded like a stab at his current situation, but he was really talking of his early days with the other mystics.

“I... enjoyed... this time... with you.” urGoh took his time and finished, and for once, skekGra’s face didn’t dissolve into twisted rage halfway through.

His expression was blank in thought, staring out past urGoh, into space. Though his eyes were distant, urGoh knew he was in thought, for the shimmering light within them gave him hope.

Suddenly, skekGra stood up, stormed from the cell and locked it again. Just as urGoh felt disappointment, skekGra stated, “this was beneficial to me, making these, er, puppets will strengthen my dexterity and my hands. We will do this again with different types next time until I’ve fully grasped the craft as you have, is that clear?”

urGoh looked up to catch that gleam again, so bright, in his eye. The cock of an eyebrow, and the faintest, faintest smirk. The game continues.

“Of… course…. _Conqueror_.”


	2. The Bond that Breaks...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh, how fragile the balance can be when one side is unstable.

The game did continue for another unum.

At first, skekGra seemed to only use urGoh for his ear. skekGra would come into the room and complain – of the skeksis council and of his travels. However, urGoh’s progress was steady. He offered advice, and over time, skekGra stopped waving him off mid-sentence and began listening, responding.

“What is your interest in these? Why are you not called ‘urGoh the Puppeteer’, as you so-called this craft?” skekGra inquired one late night, carefully painting features onto a face. Over time, his hand became steadier, not shaking as if he was constantly on edge.

Upon hearing the murmured question, urGoh could not help but shiver with excitement. Another breakthrough, to him, for skekGra never wanted to talk about anything but himself. For him to ask urGoh such a thing, to show genuine interest in his life, and to prompt him to reply – it made urGoh so happy, and his face felt warm. But of course, he held his nonchalant, gentle smile.

“In… that… regard… then… you… should be… called… ‘skekGra… the… Belly… acher’,” urGoh chuckled.

skekGra scoffed, with a smirk, not looking up from his task, “Thra, you should spend five minutes with skekTek if you feel that way! What a crybaby.” urGoh mentally marked down a personal victory for being able to tease the skeksis now without backlash. It felt domestic and… friendly.

“The… Story… teller… taught us… early… on,” he mused, cutting fabric, “we… adored… his… stories…. He told… a new… one… every… night.” When he didn’t hear anything from skekGra, he turned his eyes to the skeksis to find him wide eyed, beak slightly open. The mystic tilted his head in question.

“What does storytelling have to do with these?” skekGra squawked, holding a puppet up by the strings.

urGoh’s mouth hung open. “Oh… dear…” he said, then snorted in a giggle.

skekGra’s feathers all stood up at once, blushing. “YOU _USE_ THESE?! THEY ARE NOT JUST DECORATION?!” he screeched. His eyes were twinkling at once, and he rushed forward on his knees to grasp urGoh by the shoulders. urGoh’s giggling ceased, and his face became hot again. For once, skekGra did not claw his flesh or pin him down and squeeze his skin – he _held_ urGoh. The grip on his shoulders was firm, but gentle, as he rocked the mystic lightly back and forth.

skekGra’s beak nearly touched urGoh’s snout as he stared into his eyes, “Tell me more! Tell me everything! _Show_ me, tell me one of his stories! NO! Tell me one of _your_ stories!” His voice was so innocent, so full of _wonder_. The feeling of being held, the warmth of his hands, and his breath, making urGoh’s hair raise in a delightful sensation, made urGoh’s heart beat furiously in his ears. Even through his clothing, he felt every nerve ignite under skekGra’s bony hands. He felt their bond, felt something even more…

“Of… course,” he smiled.

~*~

Another day, something… interesting happened. urGoh didn’t know whether to consider this a milestone in their relationship, or… well, he didn’t know _what_ this was. It confused him, but… excited him.

Sometime earlier, the pair began enjoying hobbies other than crafting. Sometimes they would knit (which urGoh also taught skekGra how to do), sometimes they would paint on canvas rather than on puppets (urGoh quickly learned that red ochre was skekGra’s favorite color, for a reason he did not like), and other times they just enjoyed one another’s company and exchanged stories. No matter what they did, however, skekGra made it a point to be in the cell with urGoh, cross legged on the floor, when they interacted.

This day, urGoh laid on his back, book resting on his belly as he read. skekGra, on the other hand, was hunched over, neck bent, scribbling frantically on stacked papers that urGoh assumed was mandatory. The skeksis was fidgeting, scratching through his head feathers, and growling lowly at times. urGoh gathered that he didn’t enjoy the paperwork. What he couldn’t grasp, however, was why skekGra chose to sit on the cold stone floor rather than at his desk this time. He had always tended to his duties at his desk, but today he sprawled the papers out on the floor of urGoh’s cell. Nevertheless, he could feel the anger boiling in him from across the room, so he decided to try something to fix that.

Something that let the creatures of Thra know that they were in the presence of peace, that calmed them – or put them to sleep. Either way, he enjoyed it, and he hadn’t done it in a while since his imprisonment.

He decided to sing, the throaty deep bellow of the mystics. He flexed his throat open, and began lowly, in a rumble. skekGra didn’t look up. urGoh began to form notes, and blended them together in a melody, a tune. skekGra’s eyes looked towards him. Just as he tried to open his throat more, to sing louder and clearer, he choked.

He coughed and sputtered, hunching forward on himself. skekGra’s feathers stood on end, and he put his quill down as urGoh composed himself.

“What was that? Are you hurt? I don’t feel anything,” skekGra squawked, rubbing his own throat.

“I was…” urGoh cleared his throat and swallowed, “trying… to sing.”

“Ah, yes, I know of that. I’ve heard the mystics do that before… carry on then,” skekGra looked back down.

“I… don’t… think… I can,” urGoh croaked out.

“Eh? Why not?”

“Because… of… this,” he stuck his fingers beneath the metal collar around his throat, pulling it slightly away from his skin. It had been restricting his vocal cords from fully expanding. The collar hadn’t been a problem for him until then, for he never left the cell and eating with it on was normal. “Oh… well,” urGoh sighed, laying back down and finding the page he left off.

He looked up, however, after a moment of silence and the weight of a gaze. skekGra stared at him with a neutral expression, in thought.

urGoh was relaxed as skekGra stood up and approached him. Yet when the skeksis bend down over his lying form, towering and shrouding over his body, bending his face down close to his – urGoh bristled. He placed all four palms on the floor, ready to move away, but stayed still, nonetheless. skekGra bend forward more, and urGoh could feel his breath ghosting over his snout, lightly swishing his bangs out of his face. His face heated up, and he tensed when the skeksis hand lifted. The hand dipped into the neckline of skekGra’s robe and pulled out the key.

skekGra came as close as he ever had to the mystic then as his hands reached around to the back of urGoh’s neck. Their cheeks brushed against each other, and while urGoh was struggling to maintain his composure, skekGra had a calculated look. He must have – should have – felt what urGoh felt, shouldn’t he? Shouldn’t he be… not embarrassed, but nervous? urGoh felt like he was about to melt into a puddle.

A clink sounded at his nape, and the gentle pressure around his windpipe was removed. The tender skin was finally exposed to air after being chained for two unum, and he rubbed it.

“There… I suppose you won’t be needing that as long as the door is locked…” skekGra murmured low. However, he didn’t retreat. One hand reeled back to tuck the key into his robe again, but the other stayed, cradling urGoh’s neck, holding his head up off the floor.

urGoh swallowed hard, as he could not meet skekGra’s gaze, “Thank… you.”

He jumped a bit when he felt spindly fingers thread through his hair, scratching at his scalp and fanning out the ends. He chanced a look at skekGra, and the skeksis eyes were on his hair. His expression was solemn, and a bit… menacing? It sent not only a strange chill, but a thrill down urGoh’s spine that he couldn’t explain.

“Your hair is….” skekGra grabbed hold of a creamy blonde lock, turning it over and around, “…mesmerizing.” He reeled back, only to come forward again and push his cheek up to urGoh’s other cheek, his hard skin rubbing against soft skin in direct contact this time. urGoh felt the intense heat from skekGra’s face radiate into his, and he knew then and there that the skeksis felt exactly what he felt… and was exploiting it. He was teasing him.

Their eyes were close now, urGoh’s wide and skekGra’s half-lidded. urGoh felt the other smirk against his face.

“Will you sing for me now?” skekGra purred in a silky voice, deep enough to vibrate its way into his mind, never to leave his thoughts. urGoh breathed out, smoothly, calming himself down. The skeksis finally came around, and urGoh was elated.

“Of… course.”

~*~

_“Will you sing for me…?”_

From that point on, urGoh sung regularly, it seemed. When skekGra became frustrated at his desk, he requested a song. When he would burst through the door in a huff, he would request a song. Sometimes it was a sweet and gentle, “urGoh, sing for me, won’t you?” Other times it was a bark of “urGoh! Sing, at once!”

Either way, urGoh sang, and always did it calm the skeksis down. urGoh’s singing would falter sometimes, as he could not contain a laugh at the Conqueror’s attempt at a duet. His grating, high pitched whine and the sporadic shaking of his head amused the other, and urGoh knew the skeksis was doing so out of pure happiness, so he always encouraged him.

But the more he sung the song of the mystics… the more his heart broke.

He was beginning to feel like a caged songbird. A creature meant to be free who’s been captured and forced to sing for their master’s amusement. Well, forced was a harsh word.

At this point, he didn’t know if he’d rather be free or… with skekGra. If he were free, he would yearn to be with his other half. If he stayed imprisoned… he would surely waste away.

The more time he spent with his other half, the closer he felt to being whole again. And even in the presence of the other, he still yearned – yearned to be closer in an embrace, yearned to stare into those eyes longer, yearned to stay with him.

But he missed Thra – he missed the crisp air in his lungs, the Three Brothers beating on his skin and warming his heart, the calm waters singing at his feet. He missed his adventures and discoveries… and he missed smoking.

On this particular day, a day he did not realize would change everything - he did not want to play anymore. He just wanted to wallow.

skekGra was chirping around the room, gathering his supplies, as he would set off on his regular three-day journey that day.

“I’m thinking I will continue through the Crystal Desert – oh, but I do hate that climate! I don’t think I can go through that again, there’s still sand shards in my hair! And the heat! Oh, you must’ve felt it, didn’t you? You must have been so confused to start sweating like that-!” skekGra ceased his musing, feeling a lump roll up his throat. He turned to the cell to see urGoh, curled up in his blanket in a tight ball, only his snout visibly poking out.

“urGoh? urGoh, are you listening?! Don’t you ignore me, I will come in there and rip you out from under those co-“

“I...”

skekGra shut up when he heard urGoh mutter, low and slower than usual.

“... hear... you.”

“Yes, but are you listening? Big difference, you know, big difference! What’s gotten into you?! Are you sick?! Can’t be, I feel fine!” skekGra went up and clasped two bars as he peered at the bundled form in the corner.

“I... _am_... sick...” urGoh murmured, lifting his neck, unveiling his eyes. They were tired and sunken, “... _homesick_.”

skekGra’s feathers ruffled, “homesi-?! You have no home! You are the Wanderer, _nowhere_ is your home!”

“In... deed.”

skekGra remained silent.

“Thra... is... my home... I... miss it… I want… to… wander… once… more.”

urGoh looked up at the sound of creaking metal, to see clawed hands white knuckle gripping the bars of his cell, his prison. skekGra’s eyes were piercing, “I give you everything! I give you exotic gifts, trinkets, furs and foods! I give you all that Thra has to offer and more! What more do you want?! How dare you be unhappy - I command you to cease being unhappy!” His usual blue face was beet red, all feathers stood on end to make himself look bigger.

urGoh stared for a moment, blank expression, then scrunched his snout up, stuck out his tongue, and curled his neck away from the bars into the covers.

A mistake on his part, it seemed, as the sound of metal scraping aggressively rang through his ears. He braced himself as he heard skekGra storm into the cell.

He was ripped from his warm cocoon and pinned on his back onto the cold floor. Looking up, he saw skekGra’s furious face, panting and shaking with rage. The skeksis had his first set of wrists pinned at the sides of his head, and his other pair lay limp at his sides. urGoh put on a cold expression, of boredom and annoyance, but it only served to curl the Conqueror’s lip up further.

“I give you everything a being could want – Do not tell me you are sick! Do not tell me you want more! I fulfill your every need, want, and desire – I have given you all of myself! How dare you look upon me with such disobedience!” he snarled, spit leaking onto urGoh’s cheek.

urGoh closed his eyes, huffed a breath of warm, agitated air at the skeksis above him, and turned his face away to the side. skekGra followed him, beak digging into his snout now, pinning urGoh’s cheek to the ground. skekGra panted harder in rage. They could feel each other’s tension.

urGoh knew what this was. He knew it was a typical skeksis throwing a tantrum, their evil, greedy nature rearing its beaked head. Yet, this time… _he_ was the object of the Conqueror’s greed. He was the treasure that the Conqueror sought out… _hunted_.

“…what will it take?” came a shaky, venom dripping whisper.

“For… wha-“

“_FOR YOU TO BE HAPPY_!” skekGra screamed down at him.

urGoh, for perhaps the first time since he’d gotten there- hell, the first time in a few trine -raised his voice, and yelled, “_Set Me Free_!”

skekGra let go of his wrists and grabbed the collar of his robe, hauling him up only to slam his head back down onto the stone with a hollow noise.

“I AM THE CONQUEROR, I OWN YOU, YOU ARE MINE-!”

“_NO_!” UrGoh gritted out, eyes blurry from the pain ringing in his head,

“I... _am_... you.”

Just then, as their eyes met, as their breaths mingled from being so close, as one pinned the other so close to Thra… it gave them another vision.

They saw a Gelfling standing atop the Dark Crystal, shard in hand. He stabbed the shard into the crystal, and a blinding light purified the room. The crystal was a pristine white, fully intact, fully shining in its true radiance once again. They saw dark figures panic around the crystal. The figures were suddenly corralled towards the crystal by another set of figures, and a light beamed through them all at once. The light shined through the figures and into their eyes, as their sight returned.

The image was gone right before their eyes. When they came to, they saw each other, staring back at one another once again.

skekGra was shaking, panting like a hot fizzgig without water, and sweating like one too. urGoh lay frozen, wide eyed, goosebumps littering his skin. skekGra released his death grip on urGoh’s robe, hands still tense above him.

In an instant, he lifted himself up, off of urGoh, and slammed the cell shut as he exited.

He stood just outside the cell for a long while, staring off to the side, to the ground, grimacing.

“... you are my prisoner,” he murmured after a tense moment, “your happiness does not matter to me. Due to this... _outburst_, I will return sooner this journey, for I have a new plan in store for you… for us.”

urGoh stared at him, groaning as he got up slowly, aching.

He shook his head, “please... skekGra-“

“SHUT UP!” skekGra pounded his fists against the bars, echoing loud throughout the room.

“…_mystic_,” he hissed of pure bitterness.

urGoh’s heart broke once more. All of the progress they had made together, how close they’d become seemed to crumble to dust right before his eyes. He wanted to believe it was all talk, that the skeksis was just upset, that he didn’t really mean it… he wanted to cry out, but his throat would not open.

They sat in more tense silence, skekGra’s head hung low. He huffed and pushed off of the cell. He grabbed his supplies and his weapons. He readied himself, and took one more glance at urGoh, a range of emotions flashing within his eyes.

Rage. Cruelty. Bitterness.

Sadness. Wanting.

_Yearning._

skekGra growled aggressively, and finally stormed out of the chamber.

What he did not realize, however, that urGoh _did_ realize –

was that the cell was not locked after it had been slammed shut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HERES SOME ANGST IM SORRY JUST REMEMBER THEY LOVE EACH OTHER OKAY <:c classes are a thing I have to worry about so please be patient with me, I'm very much involved in this story!! More to come


	3. ...Is Only Bound to Grow Back...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The pair find solace in close friends, and the thin membrane holding the Conqueror's sanity together is broken.

Why…

Why did he not want to go.

Thra, tell him, why did his feet stall before him, why did his heart beat so wrongly…

This was his only chance at freedom, lest he rot in this cell by the skeksis hand. Was their bond worth his freedom? His happiness?

Did skekGra really hate him so? If he wished the same fate, wouldn’t he _want_ urGoh to be happy?

“_Your happiness does not matter to me…”_

It had to be a lie, a childish attempt to hurt the other, as urGoh hurt him.

And it did hurt. He couldn’t stand how much it hurt.

He took a step forward, pushing the cell door gently, and it swayed open. He stepped out, taking in the sight of the room. He considered his options.

Staying locked in this cell would not aide him in any way but a selfish one. He knew that he and skekGra belonged together – he believed it. And that belief, that courage, and that hope led him to step fully out of the cell.

He knew that if they belonged together, Thra would cross their paths indefinitely, no matter where he went. He made his decision, for his own good… for _their_ own good.

He had a plan already, for he needed answers. He couldn’t understand the visions – they were too blurry, and the imagery too vague - and he needed to know what Thra was trying to tell him. He knew exactly who to seek: the one that took the role of Mother Aughra in her absence, the one who knew more than even urSu, the one who understood skeksis the most in depth, and the one who was not afraid of them…

_The Archer._

urGoh searched skekGra’s chambers, and found his old belongings, taken from him after arrival and forgotten, in the bottom drawer of the desk. He also nabbed a few potions, the book on enchanting that he read over six times already, and skekGra’s favorite pen (skekGra constantly gnawed on the end of it when frustrated with paperwork). With a heavy heart, he placed the various puppets he’d made in a neat row on the desk – all except for the puppet he’d made resembling skekGra. Finally, he wrote his note to skekGra, placed it amongst the puppets, and left.

urGoh was able to dodge most of the Gelfling guards by staying hidden, and when the Podlings saw him coming towards them, they distracted the other guards for him. He moved at what was potentially the fastest he’d ever moved, or could move, knowing this was his one chance to escape.

Podlings pointed him to a back, secret entrance, and urGoh had finally felt the plush, warm soil and grass beneath his feet for the first time in almost 3 unum. He curled his toes in the dirt, filled his lungs with Thra’s breath, and basked in the radiance of the three suns - he was home.

Well, almost - he was still at the castle grounds.

He knew where he had to go, however. He opted to follow one of the forking river streams towards what he believed to be the Sanctuary Tree. There, he knew, resided The Archer - he knew he could count on him in these hard, confusing times for guidance and possibly protection. urVa was a traveler as well, so urGoh knew he might have to wait for his friend to pay the tree a visit. Either way, he was just happy to see the sky again.

He readied himself for, what he knew was going to be, a long journey, and his legs had been out of commission for a while.

All he could do was hope that skekGra wouldn’t question the aching in his legs… or that they wouldn’t run into each other.

~*~

The Conqueror was already dripping, soaking wet with blood.

The stench of bodily fluids clung to the air he invaded, clung to his outfit and his hair. His face and his weapon were smeared with blood, chunks of meat, and bone fragments. Even in his most brutal of conquests, he had never been more drenched with death than at that moment.

He already struck down three Gelfling caravans on landstrider back, a group of Podling gatherers, and two scavenging Gruenaks. Two of the Gelfling caravans were already in allegiance to the skeksis, and they pled, cried their loyalty, and begged for his mercy, but the Conqueror was in no mood. If their clans found out, he’d just chock it up to the Hunter or a freak accident, per usual. Unlike the Hunter, the Conqueror does not seek out his prey – more disturbingly, he kills merely because they are _in his way_.

His fight with urGoh enraged his very soul. It put him on edge and into a killing type of mood – he wanted to blow off all of his steam with his favorite pastime. Right now, it wasn’t about conquering.

He felt as if a precious treasure of his was in danger, and he was threatened. All he wanted to do was keep urGoh safe! Keep him… to himself. urGoh was his, urGoh was _him_! No one else deserved to even lay their eyes on him, not even Thra itself! urGoh _was_ a treasure, a source of valuable skills and advice, a knowledgeable craftsman, an educated traveler, a beautiful singer, a soft body of warmth… How his hands worked with such determination in his work, how those same warm hands lingered on his for longer than they needed to, how his lidded eyes enchanted him closer, how sweetly his siren long reeled him in the rest of the way, how _deliciously_ their breaths mingled when he stroked that silky mane of hair – how close he was, how easy it would have been to… to….

A strong, knee-buckling shiver wracked his body as his thoughts spiked through his every nerve, and the yearning he felt was absolutely unbearable.

“_Fuck_,” skekGra sighed as he felt the sensation in his loins before he even looked down. His bloodstained trousers were tented slightly, but the constricting fabric frustrated him more. He cursed skekMal for selling him on the pants at that moment.

He was disgusted with himself. Usually, he prided himself in being a skeksis with some actual self-control – the others, especially skekMal, as primal as he was, were too easily immersed in their urges. But now, getting aroused in the middle of a voyage by the mere _thought_ of that stupid, bumbling… wonderful fool… it made skekGra angrier, at the mystic and at himself.

He inhaled sharply, moved his sickle down to his outer thigh, and sliced right through his trousers, right through his skin. His ebony blood mixed with the crimson landstrider blood, Gelfling blood, Podling blood, Gruenak blood, even fizzgig blood that already adorned his armor. The swelling receded as his blood moved elsewhere through his body, and his members quickly slid back into him as the pain overwhelmed the arousal.

He took deep breaths to calm himself down, from the high and from his anger. He didn’t want to care. It was all too much, and he just didn’t want to care. The Conqueror does not care - the Conqueror has no feelings. He was meant to be a killing, dominating machine loyal to his Emperor and to all skeksis kind! It was his duty to secure Thra under skeksis rule!

Why, then, did he have an aching feeling in his chest, as if someone had ripped the shriveled little black heart out of him. He kept urGoh safe, he gave urGoh everything he asked for, everything he could have wanted, he gave urGoh all of himself, showed him sides of skekGra that even the skeksis himself had no idea were hiding within him… so why did urGoh want to leave him? Did he not appreciate all that skekGra had done? Did he not feel the same feelings skekGra had felt every time he stared into his eyes? Did he not…

skekGra began moving forward again, ignoring his thigh screaming at him to stop. He forced himself to push urGoh from his mind, but instead his thoughts were flooded with the visions they shared. He knew what they meant – he could see through the blurred visuals. Those horrifyingly wonderful visions promised him a fate only dreamed of. It made him dizzy to think about. He cursed himself, he cursed skekMal, he cursed urGoh – he cursed Thra itself for putting him through such turmoil… making him question everything.

~*~

urGoh had finally made it to the mouth of the forest, castle completely out of his sight, when he nearly collapsed. His body shook with a wave of pure yearning, pure need, and when he recovered, he clenched his knees together. To become suddenly aroused, against his own consent, out in the open embarrassed him to no end. He shuffled himself into a bush behind a tree and sat down at the base to collect himself. He tried hard to concentrate on something – anything… but skekGra demanded his attention.

Urges like this weren’t common for his kind, but they _were_ for skeksis. And he, like all mystics knew, shared this sensory with his skeksis along with pain and emotion, and it was common for a red-faced mystic to suddenly excuse themselves and retreat from a conversation for that very reason. His face became hotter than all three suns combined as he realized the disturbing truth of his predicament – that skekGra had become aroused, wherever he was. To think that the skeksis could even think of doing such a thing after their argument made urGoh’s hair raise.

But every feeling faded into pain and agony as urGoh screamed. He felt the excruciating pain blossom as the skin and muscle of his outer thigh ripped open, gushing black blood down his leg. This had happened before, but never so severe. He would get an erection out of nowhere, but just as it came, he would feel a harsh pinch on his inner thigh, and the arousal would fade. He could tell how furious skekGra must have been with himself to physically hurt himself as punishment… and it unnerved urGoh.

If he was willing to gash his own leg open, what would he do when he found urGoh gone…?

He couldn’t worry about that – he didn’t have time to worry.

He thanked himself for grabbing the potions from earlier and treated the wound as best as he could. In the back of his mind, he knew that his slow pace was just knocked down even slower, for the pain refused to ebb away. Every limping step felt like a stab, but he pushed on… he had to.

It was dark by the time urGoh finally made it to the Sanctuary Tree. He was panting – his calves burned, his knees cracked, and his wound was on fire. He collapsed on a flowerbed beneath an arching root, completely exhausted.

“ur… urVa…! urVa…” urGoh rasped out loudly, a desperate attempt. His vision blurred the twisted roots of the tree into a tangled mess, growing dizzier and dizzier by the second. As his vision faded to black, he saw a large foot stomp next to his head, but he couldn’t even lift his head to see.

“Oh… urGoh…” came a deep, distorted voice, full of compassion and worry. It warbled through his mind as he slipped into unconsciousness.

~*~

“You smell foul,” came a gravelling voice from the treetop overhead.

“_Fuck_ yourself, Hunter,” skekGra snarled, not looking up from his fire. After continuing his journey into the night, he had found himself growing dizzier with each step, and was forced to make his camp, lest he fall in a vulnerable state.

skekMal chuckled hoarsely, leaping off of his branch and landing with a thump, “methinks you’ve been doin’ a lot of that yerself.”

skekGra fixed the Hunter with a pointed, agitated look, poking his fire incessantly. skekMal sat on the other side of the campfire, knees propped high and wide to expose his core to the heat of the flames. The skeksis sat in silence, the crackling ambiance filling the space around them as they passed a bottle of grog between themselves.

“Speak, ya thick-headed twat,” skekMal barked suddenly after a while. skekGra raised a feathery brow.

“And what would you like me to say, Hunter?” he asked dismissively, rummaging through his satchel for a piece of meat.

“Anythin’, yer never this quiet wit’ me.”

“You hate talking,” skekGra placed a landstrider thigh on the rocks nearest to the fire.

“I like listenin’ to ya, yer the only one ‘a them bastards that has ‘is head on straight,” skekMal paused, taking his mask off and putting it aside, looking at skekGra bare-faced, “le’s hope y’keep it that way, mate.”

skekGra’s feathers puffed around his collar, “what is that supposed to mean, Hunter?” he sneered, narrowing his eyes.

“Chamberlain’s been runnin’ ‘is mouth off as usual,” skekMal hummed. He lowered his voice deeper, leaning over the flames to cast menacing shadows that danced among the twisted flesh of his beak,

“_Y’like singin’, don’t ya?_”

skekGra surged forward, stepping through the campfire and singeing his pants, to grab skekMal by his bone-plated armor. skekGra hauled the Hunter up in his face, and two blades were at the Conqueror’s throat at once, but he ignored them. He leaned ever closer, causing pearls of blood to drip down from his neck, as he curled his lip in a snarl. The Hunter returned a snarl of his own.

“_Watch your tongue, you primitive buffoon, lest it be torn from your mouth_,” skekGra hissed.

skekMal laughed deeply, “Conq’ror, yer a _joy_.” He angled the blades downward to catch more of skekGra’s wrinkled skin. skekGra huffed, released his grip from the other, and backed away, dodging the fire. He ran a thumb through the blood collected at his collarbone and licked it, eyes locked with skekMal’s as the other licked his blade.

Both skeksis sat back down heavily. “I’m stripping the meat from skekSil’s skinny bones when I get back,” skekGra murmured, grabbing his now cooked meal from the fire. “I have… been having issues with the mystic."

skekMal took a stone out to sharpen his blades on, “y’shouldn’t be spendin’ so much time with ‘im - y’shouldn’t even have ‘im near you.”

skekGra lifted his head suddenly before he took a bite, closing his mouth as he recalled – realized – something.

“How did you know about the visions?” he asked firmly, smirking as he saw the Hunter bristle.

“I made a _mistake_,” skekMal snarled at him, showing off his teeth in warning. But the Conqueror feared no one.

“How _is_ the Archer?”

“Seems as if _you_ don’t know how to hold your own tongue either, Conq’ror,” skekMal snarled again, more fiercely this time, raising his second set of arms along with his feathers.

skekGra huffed, taking a bite of his meal, “calm down, you savage.”

skekMal did calm down, albeit still tense, “yer th’ one covered in blood,” he grumbled.

skekGra huffed, “urG- ah, the _mystic_ recently told me that he was… unhappy with his imprisonment.”

skekMal gave him a pointed look, “’n why should that matter?”

“It _doesn’t_,” he said in a raised voice and an offended look, but his face went soft at once. He was so tired, and he was in the presence of a friend. He had to be honest with the Hunter. “It… _shouldn’t_…” he said softly, hanging his head down in defeat. skekMal hummed but waited for the Conqueror to continue.

“I fear that I _am_ changing… that I am becoming… _weak_,” he forced out that last word as if it physically pained him to say, “and yet… the rage within my very being is burning me alive, and the urge to destroy and dominate flows within my veins like a virus…”

“Ya don’t enjoy it?” skekMal inquired.

“I _adore_ it,” skekGra ground out, “the drive to further conquest is what sustains the Lord Conqueror – it is what I _live_ off of!”

“So why are ya whinin’?”

“_Because that mystic makes me want to rip his body asunder and fuck him into the ground until he squeals for mercy as I slit his throat_,” he hissed, panting and leaning over the fire. skekMal let out a bellowing laugh, “oh, I know that feelin’! Ah, but ya can’t, les’ ya got a death wish yerself… an’ that’s the hardest part, ain’t it?”

“Indeed,” skekGra sighed. He gave skekMal a hard look, “if he’s unhappy now, I’ll make sure he _suffers_ while I punish him for his defiance. If he wants to see Thra, I’ll strip him bare and use him as a pack mule until he collapses, then whip him to crawl on his belly like the ungrateful worm he is.”

skekMal chuckled warmly, “s’good t’have ya back.”

When skekGra woke in the morning, the embers had fizzled out, the suns were peeking out from the distant horizon, and the Hunter left no trace other than the empty bottle of swill. As skekGra packed his supplies back up for his return journey, he thought over what he said to the Hunter, what he said he would do to urGoh, and how much he _knew_ he wouldn’t be able to follow through.

urGoh made him enraged, but also… brokenhearted. The thought of that soft, goofy smiling snout made him want to scream.

He walked off, heading in the direction leading back to the castle, mystic on his mind.

~*~

The first sight urGoh saw when he woke up was a majestic one.

urVa was sitting on his knees, eyes closed in meditation, bow resting at his side, bathed in the morning sunrise. urGoh smiled at his old friend, feeling a spike of tears in his eyes that he blinked away – he was safe.

He groaned as he tried to move, alerting urVa out of his trance. urGoh felt all of his muscles ache at once, and he was surprised to discover the bandages around his throat, hurting his neck as he tried to crane it upward.

“Easy, friend,” came urVa’s rumbling, gentle, sincere voice. He approached urGoh and placed a hand on his head, “rest for now, urGoh… you are hurt.”

“I… have… rested… all night,” he groaned out, placing his hands on the ground and lifting himself slowly, “I… cannot… afford… to rest… any… longer.”

urVa raised a brow and placed his hands on urGoh to help the other get on his feet. “What troubles… you then, Wanderer? Why are you so… injured? If you’ve come… in search of me, I fear… the news is not well,” he spoke, helping urGoh sit upright. He checked urGoh’s bandages over, coaxing the other to lift his neck, then shuffled away to get some water and food. urGoh sighed heavily.

“It is… about… the… Con… queror,” urGoh started, pausing to catch urVa’s reaction. The Archer turned his long neck back to urGoh, wide-eyed.

“That _is_… troubling, indeed,” urVa murmured, turning back to his task, “…go on.”

urGoh explained his story to the Archer, pleaded to him. He told urVa of his capture and imprisonment, he told urVa of their friendship and their fight, and he told urVa of their visions. The Archer sat patiently at his side, not interrupting the Wanderer once during his slow retelling, silently sipping his tea. When urGoh was done, he hung his head and neck low. urVa hummed deeply, setting his tea down.

“It is a dangerous game… that you are playing, friend,” urVa stated, placing his two left hands on urGoh’s back, “but I fear that once it has started… the game has no end.”

urGoh lifted his head to look urVa in the eyes, pleading again, “what… do you… mean?”

urVa hummed, “your skeksis is persistent… I know how that can be.” He paused, breaking eye contact with urGoh to stare off to the side, “… skekMal and I have shared the same visions.”

urGoh lit up and leaned himself closer to the other, “you… have?”

“Yes, long ago… though, we were never as… _close_… as you describe yourself and the Conqueror.”

The way the Archer emphasized that word made urGoh jerk back a bit, as if he’d been burned.

“What… became… of you two?” urGoh asked gently.

“We…” urVa’s face twisted in a pained grimace, “… broke apart, much like we all did back then… during the Division. But that time…” he closed his eyes with a defeated expression, “…it hurt impossibly more.”

It was urGoh’s turn to place his hands on urVa’s back in comfort, and the two sat in silence for a bit.

“What… do… the visions… mean?” urGoh asked after a while, looking to urVa with a hopeless look.

“That,” the Archer peered deeply into urGoh’s eyes, “is for you to determine… on your own and,” he gave urGoh a hard look, “…_with yourself_.”

“urVa-!”

“If Thra,” the Archer finally interrupted him, “has blessed you with a vision… then you must listen to _it_… not _me_.”

urGoh’s face twisted, but he remained silent. He should have expected a riddle from a fellow mystic. urVa hummed deeply, grabbing hold of urGoh’s shoulders to turn him. “You must confront your darker half… for it is what Thra has destined for you… _I_ had to do so, and it is your turn now.”

urGoh said nothing, turning his melancholy gaze elsewhere.

The Archer sang out in a long resonance, and the Wanderer soon joined in his chant, their voices echoing amongst the trees and across the valley.

~*~

It was early evening when skekGra made it to the castle. He was much faster than urGoh, but he had stopped along the way to harass some Gelfling out of their belongings, no longer consumed in his murderous rage. The blood on his armor had long since dried and crusted, and the smell that he carried was old and musty. His skeksis councilmembers scrunched their beaks as he walked by, but they dared not make a noise.

Just as skekGra reached the hallway leading to his chambers, his gut twisted in hatred as a whimper rung out against the walls.

“Conqueror returns so early!” came skekSil’s whiny, prodding tone. The Chamberlain screeched a whine when a clawed paw clasped around his scrawny throat.

“Chamberlain,” skekGra purred in the same menacing voice he used when he was about to end a prisoner’s suffering, “how would you like the skin torn from your bones and hung on my wall? Or your skull used as my dinner bowl? Or-“

“N-No! skekSil is friend, y-yes?” skekSil whined out hoarsely, trying to pry the hand from his neck, feet dangling from the marbled floor.

“_No_,” skekGra ground out, giving skekSil a viscous shake, “you are a parasite, and if you compromise me again, I will take your life. Stay out of my personal affairs and keep your damn mouth _shut_.” Just as the Chamberlain’s blue face became incredibly purple, he was dropped on his behind. skekGra planted his talon clad foot on skekSil’s chest, keeping him to the floor.

“Am I understood?”

skekSil whimpered solemnly, but nodded, and was released. skekGra heard him whimper, “so mean, so mean!” as he shuffled away, rubbing his backside. He moved on.

skekGra pushed open the door to his chambers, bone-chillingly quiet and shut it behind him. skekGra out on a gruff face and turned his body to face away from the cell as he entered. He began unpacking his satchel placing potions back on his shelf as his guts twisted again, but from nervousness this time. No noise emanated from the room other than his own movements.

“urGoh…” he called out, hoping to get a response, or even the shuffling of blankets. Nothing.

He squeezed his eyes shut and took a death breath, “urGoh… I am… sorry.” He breathed out, hung his neck low as he rested his forehead on the bookshelf, back still facing the cell, “I did not mean the things that I have said, but I know that I have hurt you nonetheless… and I am sorry. From now on, I will take you on scheduled walks, so you can see Thra once again.”

“…would you like that?” skekGra’s voice was small, bursting with hope and innocence, lifting his head a bit to listen for a response.

None came.

He sighed, turning around, “I understand. I will do what I must to reconcile this… I just hope that you will find it in you to forgi-“

He stared at the opened cell door. He stared into the dark, empty cell.

His head swam, his vision blurred, and he felt as if he might have thrown up.

The dizziness faded, the realization bore into his head like a peeper beetle, and he was once again engulfed by the billowing flames of pure rage. He let out a ferocious roar, echoing through the walls of the castle, as he went to flip his own desk in a blind fury. But he stopped, hands on the rim, when he spotted the puppets they’d made. And the note.

He snatched the note, crumpling it in his hand and uncrumpling it. It was written in a beautiful handwriting, old runes that he knew how to read.

_You forgot to lock the door. _

_I am sorry. We are one in the same, and we belong together._

_However, I cannot go on as your prisoner._

_Thra gave us our visions for a reason, and I need to find out_

_what that reason is, with or without you._

_Our paths will always cross again, and hopefully in that_

_time, we will be able to come to a compromise._

_I wish you well, skekGra. _

_-Wanderer_

_(By the way, I took your favorite pen.)_

He crumpled it furiously back into a ball, but he tucked it into his breastplate rather than shredding it apart or throwing it aside. He was seething – his vision was pure red, and his skin was on fire. The itch of violence and revenge twitched through his fingers, and he finally did flip his desk with another fierce roar. The puppets flied and scattered about the room in disarray.

A gentle knock alerted all of his senses, homing in on the door like a predator. He grabbed his scythe and his sickle, and he nearly tore the door off its hinges, splintering the wood against the stone wall.

“A-AH! C-Conqueror!” skekOk whimpered, “w-we heard you scream… a-are you…?”

skekAyuk and skekEkt cowered a few yards behind skekOk, looking on at the Conqueror with fear and concern.

skekGra growled deeply in the other skeksis face, giving him a hard shove with his shoulder as he surged past them all, down the hall. He stomped quickly through the castle, ignoring any other skeksis that tried to speak to him. Armed with only his weapons, still clad in his dried bloody armor, he stormed off towards the forest yet again to locate the one with a powerful enough nose to find urGoh quickly - the same one he had conversed with the night before.

Halfway to the mouth of the forest, the skeksis stopped in his tracks. Blinded by pure rage and adrenaline, he formulated a truly evil idea, one only capable in the sinister mind of a skeksis.

He pulled his sickle out, drool dripping in globs from his beak as he panted, eyes bloodshot.

He began slicing at the flesh of his forearm feverishly.

~*~

The wail that urGoh had released was ear-piercing, and urVa nearly snapped his bow in half at the sound.

“Wanderer…! What is wrong?!” urVa yelled over urGoh’s screams, turning and hurrying over to the other.

urGoh was gripping his top right elbow with his three other hands, looking as if he wanted to snap it off of his body, separate the limb from his body to make the pain stop. He held the limb out, hand clenching, shaking incredibly hard. urVa watched in horror as the skin on urGoh’s arm split open before their eyes, gnarly gashes caused by an invisible source. But they knew the source.

urVa quickly turned to retrieve more medical aide for his friend, now riddled with various wounds.

“u-urVa…!” he heard urGoh cry desperately behind him, and he moved back over, ready to bandage the arm. The supplies were dropped to the ground when he focused on the wound. Tears and drool dripped from urGoh’s face as he breathed frantically through his teeth, obviously in agonizing pain. urVa was frozen in place, unable to move or speak, as his eyes vibrated over urGoh’s arm. All he could think of at that moment… was skekMal. That this action rivalled the Hunter’s own capacity to be so… _cruel._

Runes were carved into urGoh’s flesh, the same old runes urGoh used in his writing. urGoh trembled as he read the grotesque note scarring his arm over and over in his mind, as if it would disappear if he chanted it enough…

_“I AM COMING.”_


	4. ...Stronger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two powerful forces collide, finally, but not the pair you would expect. Not just yet.

“_HUNTER_!”

His muscles burned, and the metallic taste of blood dripped down his esophagus as he breathed. It was ignored.

“_HUNTER_!”

His wounds reopened, tore wider, and the air pinpointed every exposed nerve frayed on his arm. It was ignored.

“HUNT-… _FUCKER_!” skekGra screamed, whirling around to punch a tree, splintering its bark. The force cracked his knuckles and split his skin, and if his mind were in the right place in that moment, the pain would have been excruciating. He had reached his former camp, shouting around its perimeter for his target. He received no reply. He was... ignored.

He stood in place, a pause from his rampage as his shoulders quaked. The pain in his arm, in his body, finally registered to him as he panted heavily. He turned his arm up, surveying the damage he’d done to himself in his blind rage. Fresh blood drizzled over dried blood, and dirt teetered the edges of his sliced skin. He brought the arm up to his mouth and began licking each cut thoroughly, a desperate tactic he’s had to resort to numerous times on his travels, but this time, it was moreso to occupy himself.

He needed to find urGoh. Fast.

Though he was slow, the Wanderer never tired, a trait for which he was revered by the urRu. In the time it took skekGra to sleep, he could travel across the entirety of Thra’s surface.

He needed the Hunter, for no prey could elude his nose or his tracking. But the Hunter was not answering his call… his…

Call. The Hunter’s Call.

He completely forgot about the horn at the Castle, used to summon the Hunter. Adrenaline risen once again, he broke into a full sprint.

~*~

“urGoh, I fear deeply for you – you must go,” urVa urged, carefully dressing the arm.

“W… where…” it was muffled, as urGoh had a cloth in his mouth to bite on, to distract from the pain.

urVa hummed, furrowing his eyebrows. Truly, where could he go?

“You must go… where no skeksis foot dare venture,” urVa looked into his eyes, knowing.

The Valley, where the other urRu reside in wait.

“I… have not… been back… in… so long,” urGoh said, removing the cloth from his mouth, “you… visit… more… than I.”

“Then I will lead you there… friend,” urVa placed his hand on urGoh’s back, urging him down the hill, “but we must… hurry.”

They both heard a crunching noise, of bone popping, resonate from somewhere on urGoh’s body. He held in a scream, straining his throat with a grating grunt. urVa stopped and looked to him in concern, but urGoh’s feet did not stop, walking a bit ahead of the other.

“We… _must_… hurry.”

~*~

In a short time, skekGra was back at the castle, but his running pace did not falter.

He sprinted down halls and up stairs, further avoiding the prying voices of other skeksis behind him, pushing Gelfling that got in his way to the ground. He made it to the balcony and wasted no time in sounding the horn. He strained against the wheel, and one by one, the beastly heads sang their ominous song out to Thra, rippling against the plains, weaving through the trees.

All he could do now was curse the Hunter’s name to hurry his narrow ass over.

Panting, finally allowing himself to rest and come down from his high once again, he trudged slowly down the steps. When he made it to the main hall, on his way to the Crystal Chamber, he was finally stopped by a hand planted firmly on his chest. He slowly, menacingly, gazed up at the offender, to see skekVar. The General snorted at him and stepped aside, revealing skekSo behind him, and a few other skeksis behind him.

“What is the meaning of this, Conqueror? Why do you summon the Hunter? What evil have you brought upon our domain to warrant his aide?” skekSo pried, raising his regal voice.

skekGra slowly turned his gaze to him, unblinking, with eyes glossed over grey. skekSo’s commanding aura faltered, and his eyes went wide. The Emperor roamed his eyes about the Conqueror, taking in his ghastly appearance, and scrunched his beak up as the smell of old blood invaded his nostrils.

skekGra’s voice was dead, monotone, as if someone else spoke through him, “on my last conquest, I collected penance from a Gelfling tribe. While I slept, it was stolen from me, along with my belongings. I require the Hunter’s assistance to track the perpetrators down, for it was an act of disrespect upon skeksis rule. I want them de… punished.”

skekSo remained silent, flicking his eyes over skekGra’s body once again, peering deep into his eyes in search of something.

“I… understand. Give skekMal my grace when he arrives,” skekSo said silently.

“Yes, Emperor,” came his voice, so hollow, yet so full of emotion. It gave the Emperor a chill. He turned with a flourish, skekVar following with a snort. The other skeksis gave skekGra a wide berth, chattering silently as he walked by.

He stood before the Crystal, gazing deeply into its radiance, yet peeing far beyond it. Waiting.

…

“Chamberlain I will slice your tongue down the middle and sew it to the inside walls of your mouth.”

Footsteps retreated, with a small, disappointed whimper.

~*~

“Emperor… his arm, it had words carved int-”

“I _saw_, General.”

~*~

“What… do you… think… the… Master… will… say when… he… sees me… again?” urGoh mused, glancing at the Archer behind him. The lush grass cushioned their large feet as they walked, the low hanging leaves kissing their top buns. urVa chuckled, “I think you should worry… more about what urSol… will say.”

urGoh laughed, turning back, “I… can… already… feel… him… clinging… to… my sleeve.”

“Not much clinging can be done… with your injuries,” urVa noted, “urIm’s weak heart… may just stop beating… upon seeing them.”

“Nothing… can faze… that… old… _goat_.”

“And urAmaj will be upset… that we did not warn him… of our arrival sooner,” urVa chuckled again, poking urGoh in the side with his bow, “though I don’t think… he’ll be displeased with… _your_ eating habits.”

urGoh scoffed, smacking urVa’s bow away with his own makeshift walking stick, “well… _excuse_… me… if I… eat more… than… just… _berries_… and… _leaves_.”

“I suppose one does need… a full belly to travel… as much as you have,” urVa replied, chuckling as he was poked in the snout by urGoh’s stick, “I am glad… you are happy, old friend.”

“For… now,” urGoh replied solemnly.

Though the looming threat of his darker half ate away at his insides, being reminded of his… _family_, he thought warmly with a smile, did make him happy and excited to return.

“urSu may just cry… when he sees you again, urGoh,” urVa said sincerely.

The warm, comfortable aura that surrounded the pair as they walked was disrupted, torn apart by the rippling waves of… the Call.

The Archer froze in his place, blood turning icy, his long neck extending to the sky in disbelief.

“No… he… he can’t-”

“What… is it?” urGoh turned to him.

urVa, with a heavy voice, stated, “this… is the Call of the Hunt. Your skeksis… is calling out to mine.” urVa, frantic, rushed towards urGoh, grasping his shoulders and looking him firmly in the eyes, “you cannot go to the Valley.”

“B-But-!” urGoh’s eyes were wide in fear.

“The Hunter will track you, and he will find them – they will all be in danger!”

“Then… where… must… I go?!”

Without hesitation, the Archer stated, “the Crystal Desert, as deep as you can… his nose cannot work when it’s… full of sand.”

urGoh shook his head, eyes never leaving urVa’s, as he backed away slightly. His heart was breaking, as it had multiple times before, now knowing he was being hunted AND denied seeing his family. urVa softened his eyes, “you are strong, urGoh… stronger than any other mystic we know… They are weak, that is why they hide… but we cannot fault them for it… You must go, but you are never alone… when the time comes, Thra will not let you down.”

urGoh teared up, and some spilled down his cheeks as the Archer embraced him with all four arms. After quickly returning it, he backed away, jolting a bit as urVa undid the bloodstained bandage on his neck, wound long since scabbing over, and tucking it in his armor.

“What-”

“I do not want the Hunter… after you. If I can keep him at bay… I will. He’ll… smell your blood easily.”

urGoh furrowed his brow, then reached back into his satchel, pulling out the puppet of skekGra that he grabbed earlier, “take… this… too. I… know… it will… lead… _him_.”

urGoh sighed and looked up at urVa, confident, with a smirk, “let… _him_… come… to me.”

urVa grabbed the little doll, turning it over in his hand. He held a pained expression, and his voice welled with compassion, “oh, urGoh…” he looked up, a soft smile, “…be safe, Wanderer.”

And urGoh, as fast as his body allowed him, headed to the desert.

~*~

“…Conq’ror?”

The dull curtain over his eyes were ripped away, every joint in his body ignited once more as he spun around violently. The Hunter looked at him with an expression of angry confusion, “wot the Hell do ya want? Y’can’t get enough of me, can ya?”

skekGra strode over to him, stopping a breath in front of him, close enough to feel his heat, “urGoh is gone. You will help me find him.”

skekMal stared at him… then laughed, viscously, spit landing on skekGra’s face “your precious little pet ran away and you call a _poacher_ to help find it? You insult me.” He turned, beginning to stomp away, “I told you not to fool around with a mystic – take a cold shower and consider this a coming of your senses.”

skekGra bounded to him, twirling him around by the shoulders and grasping his armor, “You _owe_ me! If it were not for me, you would not be _allowed_ in this Castle!” skekGra pushed his chest up against skekMal’s.

“And how am I to get my trophy? You expect me to hunt prey I can’t kill? Or is this your pathetic attempt at ending your own mis’rable life?” skekMal snarled, pushing back.

“To Hell with your fucking ‘trophies’, you ninny – I need your nose not your _mouth_!” skekGra attempted to push him away roughly with his hands, but the Hunter only budged an inch.

“If its compensation you want, I’ll get it to you, one way or another, or I am in your debt,” skekGra huffed, “I _know_ you don’t have anything better to do – if you weren’t here you’d be off taking a shit behind a bush like the filthy animal you a-”

skekMal charged him, knocking him to the ground and pinning him, hissing down in his face, “_I take you to your hobbling fucktoy and you owe me. If you want to dig your own fucking grave, I’ll gladly help push you in._”

“_Good_.”

skekGra finally washed himself, albeit quickly, and changed his clothes upon skekMal’s demand, as his stench was messing up his tracking. He also hastily cleaned and bandaged his wounds, also by skekMal’s request. The Hunter inhaled the inside of the cell, the blankets, and the pillows urGoh had used, and the Hunt had begun.

Neither of them spoke. skekMal was absorbed in his senses, in the hunt. He did, admittedly, have things to say, but he would never admit to his true feelings. He knew this was a mistake - this entire hunt was a sham, and skekGra was just… confused. But the Hunter was always true to his word, and he was in skekGra’s favor, as a comrade and… friend. Maybe, just maybe that mystic would say something wrong to convince him. It had to be from the mystic’s mouth, for skekGra just wouldn’t listen to anyone else.

skekGra, on the other hand, did not want to speak.

Deep into the forest, as skekMal travelled by treetop and skekGra by ground, the Conqueror suddenly burst out, “I know… I-I know where we are, I know where this leads! The Sanctuary Tree – of course! He always talked about it!” He burst out into a full sprint, bounding forward through the brush.

“Oy ya bast-! Dammit, why’d ‘e even bring me,” skekMal grumbled, flinging himself from tree to tree, a frantic Conqueror below in his sights. But… skekGra did have a point. The scent trail was leading exactly to the tree… skekMal hardened himself and quickened his pace.

He landed on the meadow in front of the tree with a ground-shaking thump, having surpassed skekGra in the lead, who climbed up next to him, panting. The Hunter took a few drags of the air.

“’e’s been here. Stayed ‘ere for a long while, though. Stinks of ‘is blood,” skekMal remarked.

“But is he here _now_?” skekGra insisted, checking behind every winding root. 

“No… he is not,” came a deep, smooth, firm, commanding voice. skekMal bristled, growling immediately.

“_Archer_!” he whipped around to see the mystic calmly resting by a thick root, bloody cloth in hand.

“Hunter,” urVa regarded him bluntly, flicking his eyes to skekGra, “your arm… how does it _feel_, Conqueror?”

The Hunter was on him in an instant, pinning him to the root he leaned on… and an arrowhead teased the Hunter’s Adam’s apple. skekGra had to give credit where it was due – he had never seen a mystic move so quickly before.

The Hunter licked along the length of his beak, swallowing to bob the arrow up and over his throat, feeling his skin pinch. He purred.

“Conq’ror,” he called out behind him, not moving an inch, sinking his eyes deep into urVa’s, “forget the debt – I have my _trophy _right here.”

urVa’s eyes flared, and keeping his bow drawn, he blew a swift kick to skekMal’s gut, knocking him down and away. With a sharp breath, urVa released the arrow, and it sunk deeply into the Hunter’s thigh. The Hunter released a feral howl, readying himself to pounce again.

“Where is urGoh – tell me now, mystic!” skekGra growled, approaching. He backpedaled, genuinely surprised, as skekMal whirled around and growled at him, baring his teeth, foamy drool dripping to the grass, “_get back_!”

“Hunter! What are you-!”

“Forgive him,” the Archer called out to skekGra, grabbing his attention, “he always gets this way… when he’s around me… Here!” With two hands, the Archer restrung his bow, with his third hand, he held his bleeding leg, but with his back-left hand, he tossed something to skekGra over skekMal.

skekGra caught the object, realizing it was the puppet of… him. Made by urGoh. He cradled it as if it would disintegrate in his hands.

“The Wanderer lies beyond the plains… beyond the forest… where crystals flow like water, and water forms like crystals!” urVa called out to him.

“Wha-! Where, mystic? I have no time for your riddles-!”

“_The Crystal Desert, you half-witted wretch! Begone before I kill you myself and end this entire-_” skekMal was cut off by a thick, muscled tail knocking the skull mask off of his head, making his own skull throb.

“Go, Conqueror!” urVa made eye contact with the skeksis, peering deeply into his very being, “make peace with your lighter half.”

skekGra shuttered, looking down at the puppet in his hands, thoughtfully, knowingly.

The Hunter stood, ripped the arrow from his thigh, and turned around. He ignored the pain in his leg, ignored all that he’d said to skekGra about mystics, ignored all that he stood for in that moment as he glared at the Archer.

“_You always disrupt my hunt_,” he snarled, stepping forward.

“Only because you _let_ me… I’m _always_ a much worthier prey… am I not?” urVa asked lowly, pointedly. And it drove the Hunter wild. He pounced the mystic, side swiping the bow to the ground and pinning the arm that held it. urVa struggled against him, trying to kick his legs against skekMal’s sides, but his leg flared up, and the Hunter straddled him with his full weight.

“GO!” urVa gritted out, neck arching to shout at skekGra over skekMal’s shoulder, and the Conqueror needed no further initiative.

skekGra hurried down the hill, in the direction he knew to be the Crystal Desert, puppet held close to his nose as he breathed. Not to track urGoh. He just… _needed_ to smell him again.

urVa breathed out, having held his breath until the Conqueror receded from his sight. His breath was sucked back in deeply, however, in a gasp. skekMal sunk his teeth into the thick skin of his neck, clamping his beak down and giving a vicious shake to draw blood. urVa’s toes curled tightly against the fabric of the Hunter’s trousers, cautious of the wound, and his hands curled into fists as the Hunter squeezed his wrists.

“A-Ah… has it been… th-that long?” he breathed out, squirming. He gasped and grunted as the Hunter ground his hips down, along urVa’s in short, powerful, spaced out thrusts.

“_It has. Methinks y’ve forgotten who y’belong to_,” skekMal rumbled out, slurred, as he rubbed the underside of his neck against urVa’s throat, getting as much of his scent onto the other as he could, “_y’don’t smell like me anymore. ‘N we’re gonna fix that… won’t we, Archer?_”

urVa’s entire body shuddered, and he begrudgingly released a moan, feeling skekMal’s clothed members tease his own that had slipped out from his underside, just below his belly. “You are a _beast_…”

“_No_,” skekMal groaned, licking a stripe up urVa’s long neck, stopping at his ear, “_a monster_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I whipped this one out very quick, I'm sorry it's a bit shorter than the rest!! But we're almost there, to the climax!! (both meanings of the word I'll warn you, next chapter will more than likely have skekMal/urVa having wet, feral hate sex and skekGra/urGoh having sad/emotional sex, im sorry if that isnt your cup of tea!!!) Stay tuned for more to come!! :D


	5. And Even Stronger.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thra brings many pairs together, but which bonds blossom and which bonds suffer... they decide for themselves.

skekGra set a steady pace for himself.

urGoh was waiting for him.

No longer did he barrel through the forest like a rabid creature, no longer did he scrape his sides against trees in his wild haste, and no longer did he even come across another living being-

urGoh was waiting for him.

Just as he was on his conquering journeys, he knew where he was going. His mind… was clear again.

urGoh… was _waiting_ for him.

And yet… he was not waiting for the Conqueror. He was waiting for skekGra. And as the skeksis walked forward, walking _amongst_ Thra rather than _through_ it, he felt purely skekGra. He felt the laughing, smiling, sensitive and vulnerable being that had grown to _cherish_ urGoh, not the Conqueror that sought to own him. urGoh’s image caressed his thoughts, beckoned him onward.

A silent gasp escaped him when he felt sand give way between his toes, and peering forward, the jagged natural crystalline formations towered in the distance. The excitement spiked in his core, and he could not help himself from surging forward in a sprint.

urGoh, on the other hand, was consumed by unease.

skekGra was coming for him.

The longer he trudged, the farther his legs stretched out, and the faster he became-

skekGra was coming for him.

Like the asymmetrical growth patterns of the crystals surrounding him, his mind screamed uncertainties at him from every angle. What would skekGra do with him when he reached him? Would he tie him up and beat him for his insolence? Would he hold him down and scream at him again? Would Thra be able to soothe the rage that brewed within a titan such as skekGra-?

skekGra… was _coming_ for him.

urGoh’s lungs were burned by the sand shards invading them, breath labored from his journey. He had no destination, and that fact only served to rattle his nerves further. All of Thra knew that those who ventured into the desert unprepared would meet the same fate that the Dousan respected so affluently.

urVa’s previous words offered him comfort, and the only direction he had to rely on in the ocean on sand… was the Three Brothers, unmoving high above him since the beginning of time.

~*~

“_I will _devour_ you_.”

He let out a shaky breath and swallowed his heart back into his chest.

urVa brought his legs up between their bodies, planting his large paws on the Hunter’s chest, and flung the beast off of him with the strength of a landstrider. skekMal labored out a grunt as his chest nearly caved in – his back scraped against the ground as he slid a distance away from the mystic. urVa steadied himself on shaky legs, panting heavily. Grasping his bow, unstrung, he held it out in front of himself.

skekMal growled and twisted around to prowl on his hands and feet like a predator, lurking towards the mystic. His auxiliary arms raised above him in wait and his tail swiped at the air like a knife.

Steadily, eyes never leaving his darker half’s, urVa placed his bow on the ground, a ways away from his reach. Chuckling, skekMal removed his considerable number of blades and did the same, placing them down, where his mask was previously flung from his face.

skekMal sneered, flexing his three members straining in his trousers, “you already riled me up… now this? Y’want all of Thra to hear me ruin you, eh?”

“You of all warriors… should know the value… in a fair duel,” the Archer panted, lowering his voice, smirking, “besides… one must always be alert… when their prey is a predator of their own.”

The Hunter rumbled, pleased, “you’ll _choke_ on those words, Archer… if you truly _doubt_ the power of the hunt-” he rose to his full height, ripping his armor off, peeling his clothes from his sweat covered skin “-then I will _make_ you sure.”

A strained groan shuddered out of urVa – the Hunter’s erections sprang free, slapping wetly against his belly, and his pants were shucked away. The skeksis stood before him tall and proud in his distorted skin. The spikes at his hackles were raised, and his pupils blew wide enough to conceal his eye color. Those eyes captivated him – he had to stay strong. urVa willed himself not to falter, maintaining eye contact as he slowly – ever so slowly, as one does in the presence of danger – removed his robes.

Whereas skekMal threw his clothes with abandon, urVa folded his neatly. Whether he was doing it on purpose or not – of course he was, but the mystic would never admit it – his slow pace only served to agitate the beast before him even more. And he felt it. Every twinging nerve, every flexing muscle – the Archer knew what he was doing to the Hunter. The mystic’s two heavy cocks hung below his belly, fluid steadily dribbling out of the bunched skin at the heads.

urVa’s body was pudgy and well filled out, but skekMal knew the powerful force hidden beneath his soft appearance. Both beings had twisted skin – one of elegantly flowing patterns, one rippling with leather taught over hard muscle. urVa’s age was apparent in his posture; hunched spine and bent knees hindered his movement like all mystics. urVa placed a set of hands on his knees, eyeing the skeksis before him.

skekMal lowered his body to the ground, “enough of this, I’m ready to claim my trophy, Archer.”

“You,” urVa readied himself as well, using his thick tail to balance, licking his lips, “must _earn_ it.”

~*~

The soft ambience of the desert was disrupted by the sudden violent whipping of wind. Gusts laced with shards slashed at urGoh’s face, and he had to shield himself with a set of arms. His vision was being engulfed by the second, and the air was becoming too crowded by sand to breathe. Lifting his sight, he began to panic. A tumbling wall of opaque sand waves came billowing over the horizon – a sandstorm.

It was happening, the desert every creature avoided was closing in to claim another life – urVa promised that Thra was going to lead and protect him, but its wrath was nearing closer! He was going to die, and skekGra was going to die, alone and afraid and confused-!

Then he saw it. A giant rock formation, rock walls leaning amongst one another to form… a cave! His gaze was too dead set on the Three Brothers to even notice it come into view, but even the truthful beating of their rays could not penetrate the force barreling towards him.

He bolted forward, large padded feet trudging the sand easily. The hazy view of the cave led him onward – gave him hope and courage. When he reached it, he wasted no time huddling into the mouth the rocks created, while the storm was a mere hundred yards away.

The cave was dark and well insulated. Crevices offered glimmers of outside light, and the howling winds no longer plagued urGoh’s mind. He huddled to the farthest corner of the expansive cave, listening to the muffled roar of the ever-approaching storm. Besides a few large scattered boulders, the cave was empty. The absence of a floor, along with the unique way the rocks were arranged supporting one another’s weight, led urGoh to believe it was not naturally formed by Thra. Truly, if anything in the Crystal Desert was naturally formed, it would have to be made of crystal. So… who was responsible?

He watched from afar, through the mouth of the cave, as the outside plains were swallowed, and the cave grew darker. The cascading surges of sand made it impossible to see beyond a few feet of the cave opening. urGoh leaned his weight upon one of the boulders. He sighed and began to ease into whatever comfort he could.

The positive nature of his being came forward to relieve himself – while he was being hunted, he was in the middle of nowhere, therefore near untraceable. While he was in the middle of a dangerous storm, despite the impossible, he found shelter in a near wasteland. And while he was without his other half, yearning to be united again, he could feel the skeksis’ presence nearby and-

…he… he could feel the skeksis’ presence nearby… and closing in.

It was impossible, wasn’t it? The Crystal Desert expanded almost a fourth of Thra’s surface, the Hunter could not track urGoh here even if urVa failed to stop him, skekGra only had basic tracking skills, let alone any that bested even the Hunter’s own – and there was a storm outside, obscuring vision entirely! How was this happening – how did skekGra find him already?

urGoh’s stomach churned as a blurry dark figure, tall and looming like the rock pillars that protected him, appeared through the mouth of the cave, a distance away and approaching. Panic washed over urGoh again. If it was skekGra, he would be captured again, and punished, and he would never see the light of Thra or the Brothers again. He wasn’t ready – despite all the encouragement urVa swelled within him – he wasn’t ready to face his darker half.

But if it wasn’t skekGra… his heart skipped a beat.

He exhaled sharply and slid behind the boulder he had leaned on, making sure his large tail was curled in. The cave was already dark, but it was severely silent. If he could stay quiet, he would be safe. He peeked his snout out and watched as the dark figure grew darker, seeming to solidify, as it closed the distance between it and the cave.

skekGra could barely breathe – his lungs were on absolute fire, as were his eyes. But he made no move to cover his vital areas, for he had been through this before. Many a journey had he endured the crystal sandstorms in search of the Dousan, having frustratingly never uncovered the fabled clan. It was a sore topic that enraged him to relive. skekSo had belittled his attempts in the past, telling him to ignore the silly whispers and fairytales of Gelfling. But the deceased corpse of an exotic Gelfling no skeksis had ever seen before quickly changed the Emperor’s mind, who now demanded time and time again that the Conqueror find and overcome the strange tribe.

So skekGra trudged forward, unfazed but annoyed by the storm, in the direction he last had visual of the strange structure he spotted in the distance. Previously, he followed the only factor that stayed constant in the desert – the Three Brothers. But the formation caught his eye, as it was unnatural, sticking out like a Podling in a… well, anywhere but the mud. Figuring it was a makeshift Gelfling camp, he set his mind on harassing the weak to get answers and directions.

But now that the storm had overtaken his senses, a temporary shelter to sit down and think pushed him onward.

The yearning overtook him harder and harder with each step. In his mind, he reasoned that his desperation to be reunited with urGoh was finally getting to him. He needed to see the mystic again, to hold the mystic again, to smell the mystic again, but his horrid skeksis nature screamed at him to _take, contain, own._ He would have growled, but that would have required a larger intake of breath, which he couldn’t chance yet.

Finally, the entrance to the structure surfaced from the haze, but as much as the skeksis wanted to relax, his muscles grew tenser and his hackles raised. He stepped fully into the cave, his eyes having to adjust. Once he deemed the cave vacant, he moved deeper in and sat down heavily in the center.

He breathed the clear air in deeply, in large gulps through his nose, trying desperately to calm down. The yearning was unbearable, and the pulling sensation on his heartstrings was insatiable. It felt almost as if urGoh was there with him…

“_Show yourself, now_,” the skeksis was up, tense and alert, blades drawn in an instant. He heard movement in the sand behind him.

“A Lord of the Crystal commands you to reveal yourself – come out, lest I rip you from your pathetic hole,” skekGra snarled, eyes frantically darting from boulder to boulder. Thra, he felt as if he was going insane. He knew he heard movement, and no known creature lived amongst the intense sands – it had to have been a Gelfling, or…

He hissed viscously as a pain blossomed in his arm. He jumped back, main and secondary arms at the ready, believing he was being attacked out of sight. He glanced down at his arm quickly and paused.

He realized the pain was stemming from his arm, the words he carved into himself. The pain, however, was not restricted to the carved letters, and only pinpointed scabs were broken. He brought the arm up to his face and saw… the indention of teeth. Round, not pointed, and from a wide-set jaw. He raised his head at the sound of movement again.

“…urGoh?”

“…skekGra.”

urGoh heard sand displace, as if something dropped was dropped. Then, frantic footsteps towards him. His heartrate sped up, beating at the walls of his chest as the waves of sand beat at the walls of their shelter outside. Whether he was afraid or excited, he was not given enough time to figure out.

skekGra, face wracked with worry and wide-eyed, swung himself around the side of the boulder, exhaling shakily as his eyes locked with urGoh’s once again. The howling storm outside was silenced to them – blood rushed to their ears, thumping with each pound of their hearts.

No words were said. The skeksis’ chest heaved as wide as it could expand, his eyes vibrating in his head as they flickered over urGoh’s form, trying desperately to grasp how real he was. urGoh did not move, did not breathe, did not think. He stared only into the skeksis’ eyes, trying his best to read his thoughts.

With a hard exhale, skekGra charged at urGoh, tackling him down and pinning him against the sand. urGoh grunted as arms wrapped around his form, lifting his back up – skekGra pushed their chests together hard, curling his neck behind urGoh’s, cradling the mystic in his lap.

urGoh froze and balled his four fists in skekGra’s robes. He breathed calmly, slowly relaxing, and held the shaking skeksis. His cheeks flared up – the close embrace and the heat, after a day of running, made his head swim.

They needed each other. Thra, they needed each other so badly, so dreadfully.

urGoh gasped as skekGra ripped him back by the shoulders, shaking him violently. skekGra wailed in his face, eyes full of pain, “WHY?! WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME?! _HOW_ COULD YOU LEAVE ME?! I NEED YOU – LOOK AT ME! I’M FALLING APART WITHOUT YOU!”

“Stop… this! …calm down!” urGoh grit out, squeezing skekGra’s biceps hard enough to sink his nails into skin. The skeksis snarled, eyes now bright with fury, as he slammed urGoh back down to the sand, pinning him again.

“Y-you can’t leave me… I-I won’t let you,” the skeksis seethed out, expression wild and worried, “I WON’T LET YOU! I NEED YOU – I AM NOTHING WITHOUT YOU!”

urGoh opened his eyes when the yelling stopped. His heart broke as he gazed up at the skeksis, looming over him, face wracked with sorrow and misery and pain. The skeksis panted hard.

“I… I am nothing… w-without you,” he whispered shakily.

“That…,” urGoh began gently, planting his first set of warm paws on either side of skekGra’s face, “…is not… true…. Without you… I am broken… and lost… but _with_ you-” urGoh panted, and skekGra gasped, as the mystic leaned up to touch their mouths together gently, “I am whole… _we_… are _one_.”

They were so close, close enough to feel the blood rushing through one another, to skekGra’s cheeks, throbbing through urGoh’s thick neck. Their breaths flowed in and out of their mouths, lips leaning against each other.

Their faces in one another’s eyes faded into a blinding white in a flash, and the whirling storm outside was deafeningly loud and silent at the same time.

Thra gave them a vision – the clearest vision yet. No longer were the figures blurred, no longer was the imagery vague.

They saw themselves. The fierce skeksis Conqueror and the resilient mystic Wanderer, coming together to embrace in front of the crystal of Thra, the pristine white crystal beaming light into them and onto them.

They saw... themself. The urskek, GraGoh, a singular being made of pure light energy, a magnificent creature untied to the boundaries of life or age or death. The eternal bliss and ecstasy washed over them as the urskek shot up, away from the Castle, away from Thra, to the sky and far beyond.

They began floating freely, gracefully, through the cosmos – seeing, learning, observing... _wandering_.

The darkness of the universe surrounded their vision, and they were back on Thra, back in their cave, back in each other’s arms.

“_NO_!” skekGra wailed, pushing off of urGoh and scrambling back, “_i-it’s not true – it cannot be true! We can never become one again, it is impossible – it – I-!”_

“Thra… does not… lie,” urGoh lifted himself slowly, heading towards him. Slowly, carefully, urGoh took the shaking skeksis’ hands in his and cupped skekGra’s face with his other set of hands. He steadied skekGra’s head to look at him, “we… can be… one… again.”

skekGra lowered his gaze with a broken sigh. He placed his hands on urGoh’s waist and pulled the mystic closer to his body.

In that moment, they realized the sandstorm had ceased during their vision, and the world outside was clear and quiet again.

“…all of this time… I’ve been told the mystics were a threat to our eternal life, that they were… _weakness_… and we were rid of them for a reason,” his tone was tired and defeated, “but what I _feel_ when I am near you, w-when I am with you…” he hugged urGoh close to his chest, “…I would not want to live an eternity if I could not spend it with you.”

urGoh breathed out shakily, squeezing skekGra back, “and I… want… nothing more… than… to be… with you…. But-”

“But? But what – what’s wrong?!” skekGra pulled urGoh off of him by the shoulders, panicked and wide-eyed. At once, a warm paw closed over his beak, and urGoh shushed him gently.

“But,” he started again slowly, “I… cannot… give you… all… of myself… from the inside… of a cage.”

skekGra’s eyes blew wider suddenly, and his hands came up to fumble within his breastplate. urGoh found a crumpled piece of scroll paper and a puppet with frayed edges shoved in his face, and he grabbed them.

“Your – your note! I read your note, a-and the puppet! I got it from – from-”

“The Archer… is he…?” urGoh looked up, worried.

“A-ah,” skekGra looked away, “he is alright, he…”

The blush that crept along skekGra’s twisted features did not go unnoticed by urGoh, nor did the strange, shared churning in his abdomen, “what… is it?”

skekGra shook his head, feathers ruffling, “he… he is the reason the Hunter is not here. They, ah…”

The image of the Hunter pinning the Archer to the ground swirled through his mind. How feral the Hunter became, how brazen the Archer acted when handling the Hunter, how well they coincided with one another… and how _similar_ they were to him and urGoh.

He shuddered.

“_urGoh_,” he breathed out, pulling the mystic close again, pressing their mouths together like before, “I _need_ you.”

~*~

urVa groaned as three cocks intertwined with his own two, surrounding the sides and sliding in between.

After a scuffle, the two were bruised, bloody, scraped, and dirty – all while being naked and aroused. They had wrestled, clawed, and bit one another, one slamming the other hard onto the dirt floor, enough to knock the wind out of both of their lungs. It was a fight of dominance – a fight in which the prize was the submission of the other.

And right now, urVa was the one pinned and exhausted, muscles and will growing weak… while the Hunter’s veins pulsed with energy just as strong as when they started.

In his defense, urVa pinned skekMal two times in the past hour, which he was proud of, but the Hunter had him beat at a whopping five times. While the Archer was strong and could hold his own against the dangers of Thra, the Hunter actively sought out the warriors of Thra, taking the heads of only the strongest and worthiest – urVa only hunted for food.

“You are a fool to challenge me. The Hunter will never fail – failure means weakness and weakness means death. _I am eternal_,” skekMal sneered matter-of-fact down at the mystic. His wicked tail swished high above his back, ready to whip down and lash urVa’s legs if he made a move. He had the Archer’s four wrists pinned and was rolling his hips incessantly against the other’s.

Drool leaked from skekMal’s maw, and his tongue already hung from the side. He leaned down, grasping urVa’s hidden ear with his tongue-

“_Submit_.”

urVa drew a sharp breath through his teeth, “…_make_ me!”

Locking his jaw, he slammed his skull up against the Hunter’s. A loud hollow noise echoed out on contact, as well as a pained grunt from the Hunter. Seeing his opportunity, urVa wrapped his thick tail around skekMal’s middle in an attempt to throw him off, but the Hunter was already recovered. He sunk his feet talons into the dirt, and his claws into the meaty flesh of the tail around him, wrenching it away.

“Now you gon’ n’ done it,” the Hunter growled. urVa regret his headbutt in that moment, as his vision swirled, and his concentration wavered. He groaned as he felt a swift kick to his ribs, and a fist twisting through his hair made it impossible to think. The breath was swept from his body as his head was slammed to the ground once, twice, and again. His body was failing him, as was his sight, and his moans were the only coherent sense he could decipher.

He felt himself being flipped over onto his stomach, and as much as he wanted to resist, he felt powerless. As his vision cleared and the dizziness subsided, he felt a weight on his back hinder his breath. His mind yelled at him, “fight – get up and fight! You must not yield so easily!”

But his arms would not move. After a few tugs, he discovered that all four had been tied behind his back. Any movement from his legs resulted in a cruel hand slapping down and clawing his flank, and the Hunter’s second set of hands held strong onto his tail. Above all, another hand gripping his top-bun prevented him from turning back to even look.

He was trapped.

Once more, he felt the Hunter’s sickly hot breath ghost over his cheek, and that teasing tongue slithered around his floppy ear-

“_Submit_.”

“No!” urVa grunted, struggling with whatever might he had left – which was severely depleted. He wiggled and squirmed, and each movement earned him another painful reprimand. Finally, the Hunter snarled viciously, “_enough_,” and closed his beak down onto urVa’s sensitive ear.

The mystic gasped dreadfully, and his body seemed to collapse on its own. The thin skin of his ear bled as it was pierced, and skekMal chuckled, licking it clean.

“_Now_,” skekMal purred, shifting his hips behind urVa’s tail, against his behind, “will you yield? Or will I have to _make_ you, as you so eagerly suggested?”

The Archer whined. Three hearty cocks smeared wetly across his behind, prodding playfully at his twitching entrance just below his tail. Sticky globs pearled out of his members hanging below him in anticipation. His face washed over in shame and defeat, lower belly twisting in knots.

He couldn’t take it anymore.

“I… ah- I…,” he grunted, shifting. The Hunter squeezed his hands enough to make bones creak, and the pointed tip of one of his cocks caught on the rim of urVa’s entrance.

urVa sighed, finally relaxing himself – so many times had he been in this exact position, each time he gave way earlier and earlier-

“I give up, Hunter… _I yield_.”

With a piercing growl, skekMal leaned forward and clamped down onto the Archer’s nape. urVa’s entrance was penetrated, one cock only sliding in about two inches, but it served to make him cry out nonetheless.

“I’ve been thinkin’ about you for a while, y’know that? Been thinkin’ ‘bout breedin’ you again,” skekMal purred, jerking the tip of his cock deeper and deeper, teasing, “y’miss my seed drippin’ from you, eh?”

“I can’t say… I miss _any_ part of you,” urVa eyed him sideways, clenching his hole around the member sinking ever deeper into him.

“_Don’t_ lie to me, ‘s like you say – what _you _feel, _I_ feel – ‘n right now I feel yer insides quakin’ like a bitch in heat,” the Hunter sneered, plunging in all the way. His bony hips slapped firm against urVa’s fleshy bottom, and the Archer crooned.

The mystic, despite his aching muscles, bucked upward to plant his feet solidly, and he ground his own hips back up against the other, “no manners… no restraint… one day, _I_ shall have _you_… on _your_ knees.”

Pausing, the Hunter let out a sturdy chuckle. The slap that resounded as he brought his hand down on urVa’s behind was louder than the yelp that also came from it, and the Hunter used his own knees to push urVa’s back down.

“How many trine has it been? How long have you gone saying that? And yet here you are, still weeping on the ground for my cocks to spread you open!” skekMal chuckled. His hips shifted back, cock pulling out all the way. A second erection lined itself along with the first, both pushing against the tight ring. The Hunter leaned close, growling, “_y’do it on purpose, you do – yer a little _brat_ whose mouth gets you in more trouble-_”

“_And you _love_ it_.”

The Hunter snarled ferociously, pumping hard enough to make the mystic’s teeth chatter. He crooned as he felt his own anus quiver through their bond, fluttering around nothing, yet so full. But not full enough.

He rotated his hips around slowly, grinding skin hard against skin. He positioned himself up on his feet, and he hunched down to lord over the other’s back. With two members already stretching urVa’s hole open, skekMal’s third and final member twitched incessantly nearby, smearing fluid across the Archer’s cheek. urVa sighed shakily; his face grew hotter and hotter with each pounding of his heart, and the anticipation was eating him alive.

“Y… you call this fucking…? Th-The mighty Hunter… I e-expected… more from you… I know you can do… better,” urVa panted out.

“_You _insult_ me_,” skekMal growled, then chuckled. Curved claws tickled against urVa’s inner thighs, navigating closer and closer to his groin, where his dual cocks pulsed weakly. His members hung down, swaying with every jerk, pitifully. “_Should know better by now – that I ain’t _stupid_. Think yer little game’ll work? Y’think pissin’ me off – insultin’ me – will git you your way? No, that ain’t how this works.”_

Finally, for the first time since they started, a single hand wrapped around both cocks and gave a single, jerked tug. urVa cried out, and his toes curled in the dirt. The Hunter growled when their entrances twitched in sync, and he reveled in the Archer’s cries when both cocks, along with his hand, were removed. At that point, the Archer heard soil disperse as the heat of another body left him, and he curled his head around in surprise.

The Hunter fixed him with a grin. He stood, proud and tall, as he stroked his three erections, “_look good down there, ya do. Might keep ya down there fer a bit, since yer so eager for it – you should learn some_ patience_.”_

_“_You are cruel, Hunter,” urVa, beside himself, smiled, and turned his head away. He shifted his knees wider and wagged his bottom at the other, earning a growl.

“We’ll see who has more patience.”

~*~

“I-I promise I will keep you in a cage _no longer_, I will ch-chain you no longer, I w-will give you everything you want,” skekGra’s hands glided across urGoh’s skin, following the patterns engraved in it, under his robes.

“Th-the skeksis… what… w-what will they-?”

“_To Grot with them_ – they are _fools_, I’ve known that and kept quiet of it for too long,” skekGra growled. He nuzzled his beak under urGoh’s mane and breathed deeply, spreading his knees and pulling the mystic closer to his chest. urGoh pulled his head out from its burrow and eyed him seriously. The Conqueror sighed, “very well. We will have to come up with a plan. I can tell them you escaped – that a Podling set you free in my absence-”

“They… would kill… the Podling.”

“And?”

The Conqueror – mighty and ferocious – jerked his head back in surprise, eyes wide and furry brows raised, at the venomous sight before him. urGoh sneered at him and began moving away from the other.

The skeksis panicked, scrambling, “t-they might not kill it! O-One Podling life is meaningle- ACK!” His cheek stung as a hand smacked across it.

“_That_… right there…. That… is something… I will _not_… put up… with,” urGoh narrowed his eyes at the pitiful sight before him. skekGra, now rubbing his cheek, looked up at him with large, welling fizzgig eyes – the mystic was sure that if he had a bottom lip, it would be quivering. His sternness did not faulter, “if… you are… so willing… to… change… for me…, you… are to… no longer… harm… another… creature of Thra…. If you do… then… you are… no better… than… those… you call… _fools_.”

skekGra pulled urGoh back into his lap, “then I give you my word, as not only a skeksis Lord, but as myself – for you, I holster my blade indefinitely.”

Satisfied, urGoh rested his head on skekGra’s shoulder, straddling his lap.

“I… I don’t want to think of what the skeksis will do if they know of us. My position will only get me so far with the Emperor… we will have to keep our union hidden. When I go out for my, ah, ‘conquests’… I will come for you instead,” skekGra murmured.

“And… is that… to be… our… fate… for eternity?” urGoh murmured back, clearly not sold.

“Of course not, my dear. We will be together as we wish, but in time,” skekGra preened urGoh’s hair with his beak. The skeksis chuckled lowly, “my, my – for a mystic, you are quite impatient.”

urGoh wiggled his hips against the other’s, “and… for a… skeksis… you are… quite… a _tease_.”

skekGra rumbled darkly, rubbing his neck on urGoh’s, spreading his scent, “a tease, eh? You’re one to talk – heating me up and running off like that.”

“You… seemed… rather aroused… up until… you… carved… our arm… like a stonemason,” urGoh remarked, returning the neck rub.

skekGra hummed, “I was desperate – I thought I had lost you,” his breath ghosted over urGoh’s floppy ear hidden under his curtain of hair, “…_I missed you. I’m sorry_.”

Simultaneously, the two shuddered. urGoh’s dual cocks twitched as the hardened, and skekGra’s lips opened as three flushed heads peeked out. At once, skekGra’s claws grabbed hold of urGoh’s hips and ground him down into his lap. Their groins connected, through cloth, exciting them even more.

“_I need you; I want you – oh, dear Wanderer, make me feel whole again,_” skekGra whimpered, feverishly ripping open layer upon layer of robes. urGoh panted, trying his best to keep up with the pace, but skekGra found his prize before the mystic could think.

urGoh moaned out helplessly. skekGra’s thin fingers wrapped around his thick, left member. A twisting tug had both of their hips rolling.

~*~

urVa was a mess, and skekMal was no better.

Not long after their standoff, the Hunter was back for more. He had his third member plunged in alongside the other two, being squeezed. With one hand, the Hunter grasped the Archer’s hip and lurched him backward against his cocks in time with his thrusts. With the other hand, the Hunter reached down and grasped the head of one hanging cock, rolling the sensitive tip around between his thumb and finger.

urVa whined. His strong, powerful arms and gentle, calloused hands were still tied cruelly behind his shoulder blades, and no amount of tugging could budge the expert knots that bound them. He curled his head back, sweat causing more dirt to cling to his skin, and his eyes caught the Hunter’s. At that point, he was fully bend over urVa, pounding into him like an animal in heat – and that wasn’t far off from the truth. Like the filthy animal he was, the Hunter’s pupils were blown wide, and drool flung from his beak as he humped almost desperately. _Wild_.

The Hunter had staved off three orgasms by then, solely to prolong and heighten the Archer’s suffering, but he himself was getting tired. His thrusts grew staggered and uneven, his cocks all spasmed harshly, and his lower gut twisted about in that delectable familiar sensation. urVa felt everything that he felt, and they both knew one could not release without the other. It was time.

“_This is where you belong – on yer knees with a cock breedin’ you like a sow,” _skekMal snarled.

“J-Just, ah! Just g-give it to me!” urVa struggled out with all his might. His mind, his morals, his very being were all lost to him now – all he could think of was skekMal, all he could think of was their release, all he could think of was their _bond_.

And it was disgusting to him.

With one last flex of their lower abdomen, both the skeksis and the mystic reached their peak and leapt from it. urVa bit his tongue as he felt himself filled with warmth and moaned through his teeth at the pulsing in his stomach. The Hunter was right – it _had_ been a while. Something was… off, however, about his release.

He felt the Hunter move off, and out, of him. As his high faded, he a building still resonating in his abdomen, and he realized that the beast that had just ravaged him was now circling him.

Pain blossomed in his scalp, and his world dissolved to blurs of color. His hair had been tugged upward, stretching his neck harshly as he swallowed. When his vision resurfaced, he saw the Hunter, stroking a still erect right erection as the other two lay limp by his hand. His eyes were narrow, and his grin was wicked. Ah, yes, this was something the Hunter had always done – and the Archer always forgot about until the end.

“Y’see this? This is why ya can’t return to that hole with the other mystics: you _reek_ of skeksis seed – _my_ seed,” skekMal chuckled, passing his sharp tongue over sharper teeth. urVa’s eyes locked with the scarred hand pumping the red, veined, sensitive organ frantically. He felt his own stomach curl once again, weakly, as white bubbled from the tip. He pinched his eyes shut and opened his maw wide.

“_Good boy._”

Hot, white bursts of cum coated the mystic’s face and tongue, and he felt himself release on the ground under his belly again. Quickly, he swallowed what landed in his mouth; he would have spit it out, but many trine taught him that would lead to a black eye. Panting, he grimaced when he felt skekMal’s clawed fingers smear his own cum over clean parts of his face, massaging it in like lotion. He grunted and shook away, but his teeth clattered together when the Hunter let his hair go.

He felt the binds on his wrists being untied, albeit roughly, like the skeksis was frustrated that he was even obligated to untie him. Finally, with his wrists free, the mystic sprawled onto the cold soil, defeated.

As their encounters often unfolded, he enjoyed the experience at its buildup and height, but was always left feeling empty, disgusting, and alone. Every instinct in him yelled at him, pleaded with him, to go and embrace the being that just did this to him, and he knew the other felt it too. There once was a time that the two would embrace, in another time.

Turning his head behind him, he saw the skeksis already dressed in his underclothes, cursing at himself for ripping holes in certain areas, and reaching for his armor. urVa chuckled warmly, sincerely. With a small amount of struggle, urVa stood on his feet and stretched his muscles.

“What will become of… the other two… I wonder,” urVa murmured out loud, shuffling towards his own belongings.

“Feh. Fools, both of them – don’t realize they stepped in fire ‘til they don’t have skin left,” skekMal grunted, fixing his mask on.

urVa halted picking up his robe, “I suspect, then, that we both… may need some serious medical treatment.”

skekMal merely snorted, “cheeky. There’s a diff’rence between us ‘n them.”

“Is there?” urVa turned away, dressing himself, “enlighten me, then.”

He stood his ground as the Hunter stomped towards him, matching his cold, hard stare.

“_I don’t love you_,” skekMal sneered, venomous.

With even more venom, urVa finished skekMal’s thought, “_…not anymore.”_

~*~

Both were panting hard, eyes never leaving each other’s – locked there by some unseen force.

skekGra had one cock in each hand, both impossibly thicker than his own. He stroked slow and gentle, savoring each inch of pulsing sensitivity. His smaller set of hands were stroking lovingly through the mystic’s soft hair, threading sand out of it and undoing knots.

urGoh played and fiddled with skekGra’s members, just a bit thicker and longer than his fingers. His strokes were experimental and teasing, stroking by interlacing his fingers with his partner’s erections, between his knuckles, like lovers holding hands.

Feeling a wave of heat, skekGra surged forward, smaller hands pulling the mystic’s mouth to his, as he entangled their tongues. He grasped urGoh’s hips and bucked up into his stomach. Moaning, urGoh removed his hands as well and rutted back against the other’s thrusts.

skekGra pulled his beak away, breathing hard, “th-there were times, when… when I would do this alone, after I would e-encounter you… on my travels. I _thought_ about y-you during it, about how I _knew_… y-you could feel it too.”

urGoh whimpered, fisting his hands in skekGra’s robes.

“I-I thought about you… r-red faced, embarrassed… w-with a hand over your mouth, trying _desperately_ not to make a s-sound, not to give in… _but you always did, didn’t you?_”

urGoh bit his lip and closed his eyes. He planted his knees harder in the sand, thrusting desperately down onto skekGra’s lap.

“Do w-what you used to, urGoh – show me what you did, a-all those other times… show me what drove me _mad_.”

At once, urGoh buried his face in skekGra’s shoulder. A hand, shakily, unwove itself from the skeksis’ robe and moved behind himself. His large tail crooked upward, and his hand disappeared beneath its girthy base. Not long after, the skeksis was growling deep in his throat, thrusting up rougher.

Through their bond, just like the other times he had mentioned, he felt his entrance quiver as if it was being prodded at and stroked. urGoh plunged his finger in deep, and they were both gone.

With a shudder, uttering each other’s names, they finished together. Three pulsing red members quaked as they shot, and two thick dark members jumped. Loads of white cum coated their bellies and stained their clothes, and the mess was only smeared further when urGoh collapsed onto skekGra’s chest.

Long, lanky yet strong arms curled around his form – welcoming, loving. Their breathing calmed simultaneously.

“I… needed that… more… than… you could… ever… imagine,” urGoh murmured, soft and tired. skekGra merely chuckled, but his eyebrows cocked as urGoh moved to look him in the eyes, stern again, “you… you are… the reason… I wandered… so much…”

skekGra stayed silent, supporting urGoh as he sat upright in his lap. The mystic looked down in thought, looking up into his eyes again after a moment, “I… have… always… felt… the compulsion… to wander… to look… to search… but… you are… what… I have been… searching for…. What… I was… missing…. I… have always… been… told… that… I am… lost…. But… with you… I… feel… _found_.”

skekGra nuzzled his beak against urGoh’s snout fondly, humming. He looked into urGoh’s eye from the side, “and I have found you, the same piece that I was missing. No longer do I feel the need to conquer, for I have found what I am willing to _fight for_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FINALLY!!! MAN, this chapter is quite long and not exactly as I would like it, but it's passable! With so much work over the last month, so much work ahead of me for finals week, I'M WIPED OUT! <:C but! this story is not over yet, if any of you are even still interested hehe <:) stay tuned for more!!

**Author's Note:**

> I had this first chapter sitting in my notes for a bit, and had to edit it severely! I haven’t read any of the books, I’ve only seen the movie and the series!! I just wanted to fantasize about these two having angst!! More to come!! :)


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